


A Change in Appetite

by sinsense



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Dubious Consent, F/M, M/M, Succubi & Incubi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-05
Updated: 2013-12-05
Packaged: 2018-01-03 13:09:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 28,396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1070824
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sinsense/pseuds/sinsense
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p></p><blockquote>
  <p>What would be ideal, really, is a bait service for people fighting supernatural creatures. Some sort of temp agency, with people who are willing to risk life and limb to help the defenders of good and right.   It would be a pretty sweet job, all things told.  All the bait-person would have to do is look like a delicious source of life energy. The bad guy comes over, says hi, goes in for the drain, and then bam!   Dead monster, wreaths of glory, and a paycheck. Also mortal terror, okay, Stiles understands that no one is a fan of that, but he's pretty sure people would get a kick out of being so useful in the <em>war against the fucking night</em>. Stiles would apply for that job.  Hell, he’d take the job at hand, even if it meant dressing up like a girl.</p>
  <p>Which-- actually. That's not the worst idea, is it?</p>
</blockquote>Or: Stiles dates a sex demon.  Derek doesn't approve.  It all goes about as well as expected.
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> **Warnings:** The sex demon character influences Stiles' decisions, meaning that his ability to consent is affected. There is also a description of a panic attack. In the first chapter, Stiles attempts to pass as a woman; it's implied that he's clocked, but there's no transphobia in word or deed. You can message me here or at sinsense@yahoo.com if you'd like more detailed warnings.
> 
>  **Thanks:** I started writing this for a tumblr prompt by desfinado, way, way too long ago. I doubt she even remembers it, but thanks to her for the first germ of this.
> 
> SuperfluousEmi claimed my story, first and foremost, and then proceeded to draw beautiful art for it. Two of her images are embedded in the text, but I really hope you [go to her page and comment/kudos directly](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1067956). I also want to commend her on putting up with my incredibly last-minute approach to everything. Really, she went beyond the pale.
> 
> This story is only being posted because of shiningartifact. I would have ditched the story entirely, if it wasn't for her. She did beta work, but more often dealt with my whiny emails and frantic messages. I was well and truly gobsmacked by her patience. In other words: thanks, dude.

  
  
Cover page by [SuperfluousEmi](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1067956)  


“You know Nancy, right?” Scott drops his tray on the lunch table. Stiles startles, scrawling a line across his calc problem set. “Whoops, sorry.” 

“It’s pencil,” Stiles says, and starts scrubbing it out with the eraser. “Who’s Nancy?”

"You know Nancy,” Scott says. “She's in your history class this year, she had pre-calc with us."

"I don't remember her."

"She has brown hair–"

"Hold on," Stiles says. "Why are we talking about Nancy?" 

"She told me that there's a roofie epidemic," Scott says. 

"She told you that people are catching roofies? That's not how roofies work."

Scott huffs. "Not like that. She said that she heard that there were a bunch of women getting sick, like at bars and stuff. She told me that I should help her warn everyone."

"And you thought of me," Stiles says. "I'm touched."

Scott laughs. "No, it's just– it's suspicious, don't you think? It might just be roofies, but–"

"But let me welcome you to the greater Beacon Hills region," Stiles says. "Where our motto is: 'It's Definitely Supernatural!'"

"Yeah," Scott says. "Or, 'Whoops, Sorry About That Ogre.'"

"'No Time to Jack Off: Monsters.'"

"Tell me about it," Scott says glumly.

They share a moment of silence. 

“Ugh,” Stiles finally says, and takes a giant bite of his sandwich. “Whatever, I’ll check it out.”

\---

Beacon Hills has become something like a supernatural vacation spot. Most of the time the people (and other assorted creatures) who visit are relatively friendly. They met a mermaid who did not drag Stiles into the sea – even when he asked – and a surprisingly chatty, cheerful aboleth. The vegetarian redcaps were actually very good houseguests, even if they did get beet juice on Mrs. McCall's cabinets.

Of course, there are still episodes of harrowing evil. Unicorns, it turns out, are not always virgin-loving sweethearts. A band of skunk apes came through that were just about the worst-smelling visitors of all time, and the less said about Acheri demons the better.

Which is to say that Beacon Hills is _busy_. Stiles has learned through painful experience that he can write a rough draft of a personal statement, make a passable dinner, and carve up to fourteen stakes in one night. It used to be that Stiles would do all sorts of legwork in the name of research. Now he knows better, and conserves his energy. 

He starts by snooping through his father's files. The reports tell him who the women were and where they were attacked. He makes a couple of logical jumps – the victims were at a bar, all of the incidents happened on weekend nights – and guesses that it's something having to do with sex. His spreadsheet can be sorted by type, which gives him fourteen creatures who attack in sexual contexts. He transfers the list of possibilities into a word document and prints it out, and still has time for his English homework.

\---

"It's probably an incubus." Stiles passes his notes over to Scott. "They use glamours, they're indigenous to North America and western Europe, and they feed on sexual energy. It could be a popobawa – a popobawa would actually make even more sense than some sort of incubus or succubus – but they mostly show up in Somalia. That seems like a long way to travel just to get your hands on a nubile young woman." 

"Right," Scott says.

Stiles shrugs. "That's pretty much what I've got, dude."

"What did Deaton say?" 

Stiles fidgets with his notes. "I didn't ask him." Before Scott can say anything, he adds, "He told me I was getting good enough to handle some of this on my own, and I should stop bothering him. I can handle this one."

Scott nods, but it's uncertain. "If you're sure." 

"I'm sure," Stiles says. He gestures at the corkboards on his walls, covered in pictures and papers. "I know stuff. I know so much stuff. How long have we been doing this, dude?" 

"Okay, yeah," Scott says, after a moment. "What's the plan?" 

"Some of the suggestions from the bestiary don't really make sense," Stiles admits. "They say that an incubus normally gets really attached to one person, and that one person has to give a confession, or change houses, or be 'excommunicated by saintly men.'"

"And this one isn't attached?"

"No, I don't think so. I think he's working alone. But the books said that the sign of the cross and a Hail Mary could work. Or an exorcism. I know how to do both of those."

"An exorcism, the Hail Mary, and the sign of the cross," Scott repeats. "That's it?"

"No, actually. Yahoo!Answers had a couple of options." Stiles digs through his notes. "They're the kind of whackos that know this stuff, they helped that time with the giant. They said a silver knife would work."

"Where are you going to get a silver knife?"

"I'll probably have to make a shank out of my grandma's flatware. I figure my dad won't notice it's gone, though. And I suspect my grandma would have been more than happy to contribute to the cause. She didn't really cotton with premarital sex, and what else are these things but premarital sex?" Stiles stops and considers. "Hold that thought," he says, and goes to the door. "Dad!"

"What?"

"Where's Grandma's silver?"

There's a long, weighty pause. His dad yells, "Is it a creature you've handled before?"

"Yes!" Stiles says. Scott opens his mouth, but Stiles waves him off. 

"Is Scott going with you?"

"Yes!"

"In the basement," his dad says, finally. Stiles fist pumps. "Don't do anything stupid, Stiles."

"Never," Stiles calls, and magnanimously ignores his father's loud snort. He shuts the door again, and says, "So we have a silver knife." 

"Okay." Scott hesitates. "But what if those things don't work?"

"There are pretty much forty options, dude, one of them has to work. Anyway, if everything really goes south, I figure you can just go all _rarrgh_ ," Stiles says. He makes claws with his hands to illustrate. 

"I don't know," Scott says again.

"You won't even have to hurt him! Just, if it gets hairy, then you get hairy." 

Scott doesn't even roll his eyes at that. Stiles sighs, and decides it's time to bring out the big guns. "Did I mention that it might not be an incubus?" he asks.

"You just said that's what it was."

"Yeah, usually if you're talking about sex demons and women, it's an incubus. But Bump isn't a straight club. I'm actually pretty sure–" He pauses, making sure that he has Scott's full and undivided attention "–that it's a _lesbian succubus_."

Scott's eyes go wide. 

"So you agree, excellent," Stiles says. Scott looks embarrassed, but he shrugs, which is just like agreeing. "Luckily enough, I have a plan on how to lure a succubus into our holy clutches."

"What is it?"

"Well, to start, we need bait."

\---

Bait is pretty hard to come by, though.

What would be ideal, really, is a bait service for people fighting supernatural creatures. Some sort of temp agency, with people who are willing to risk life and limb to help the defenders of good and right. It would be a pretty sweet job, all things told. All the bait-person would have to do is look like a delicious source of life energy. The bad guy comes over, says hi, goes in for the drain, and then bam! Dead monster, wreaths of glory, and a paycheck. Also mortal terror, okay, Stiles understands that no one is a fan of that, but he's pretty sure people would get a kick out of being so useful in the _war against the fucking night_. Stiles would apply for that job. Hell, he’d take the job at hand, even if it meant dressing up like a girl.

Which– actually. That's not the worst idea, is it?

"No," Scott says. "That is actually the worst idea."

"Excuse me? I could be a girl," Stiles says, insulted.

"No, of course you could–"

"Hey! What the fuck, dude?"

"You just said you could be a girl," Scott says. "I'm agreeing with you."

"But you shouldn't agree so quickly!"

"No, I mean–" Scott sighs. "Okay, so you'd have to look like a girl, which would be difficult but doable.” He pauses, and Stiles grants him a grudging nod. “But it isn't just that. You'd also have to try to lure in a succubus."

"Well, yeah, exactly. We can cut out the middle man! Woman, whatever. No need to teach someone the Hail Mary."

Scott looks at him intently. "Stiles. You'd be posing as a lesbian to find a succubus. She's a bewitching creature of the night, who might potentially discover that you're a dude. That isn't going to end well."

"She'd be warned by then," Stiles says. "I'm going to lurk in the background, scoping her out, and then I'm going to lure her into an alleyway. I'm not letting her get to second base. I won't even be first-basing it, as tempting as that may be. We're talking kiss and stab, here. I'm going to ruin her night before she even gets to my dick."

Scott considers this for a long, long moment. "You're weird," he finally says.

"You learned that a long time ago," Stiles says. He accepts the punch to his arm as his due.

\---

Scott isn't wrong, Stiles can recognize that. Stiles’ plan might even be Derek-level bad. It's very likely that the succubus is going to try to eat him, and that Scott will once again have to ruin a shirt and punch a monster in the face.

But maybe Stiles could be the hero this time. 

When they go up against the bad guys, there's usually a whole horde of them, usually with astonishing supernatural powers. Stiles’ magic is mostly long-range, and unreliable besides; he’s really only good at protective spells. He only fights when he's trapped or wounded, and he invariably gets his ass kicked. It's just one bad guy this time – a sex demon, to be fair, but only _one_ sex demon – and Stiles will have weapons.

There really isn’t anything wrong with being a sidekick, Stiles knows that. He doesn't mind being Jughead; Jughead is an invaluable presence in Archie's life, though, even beyond sandwich-related reasons. Jughead makes profound contributions to the town of Riverdale. Stiles has a powerpoint presentation for anyone who disagrees.

Still: the comic is named _Archie_. Archie's the one who gets the girls. Archie's the center of attention, even when he's doing that angry chipmunk face and being a jerk. 

This succubus, it's like Stiles' chance at making his own _Jughead's Time Police_. Short-lived, sure, but fucking awesome. It'll be a story Stiles can tell himself when he's singing back-up for Scott again.

\---

The only problem with the plan now is that Stiles has to become a girl. 

He needs to be a plain-looking girl, which rules out the people he met at Jungle; they’re all too glamorous for his purposes. Other than them, though, he doesn't have many options for advice and assistance. 

Cora's right out; she'd probably gut him before she helped him. Scott tells him that Allison is "naturally beautiful." Stiles asks her about it anyway, since Scott would think she didn’t use makeup even if her entire face was bright green. She's not very helpful, in the end; she gives him some advice about foundation and eyeliner, most of which he already gleaned from the packaging of some Maybelline.

Which means he's down to his last option. 

"You must be kidding me," Lydia says. It comes out crisp, like she's giving him an order. 

"My life is a farce wrapped in satire and boiled in tragedy," Stiles tells her, "So no, I'm not kidding."

"Then no," she says.

"I think you actually mean yes," Stiles says. "I will follow you around school, Lydia."

"You already do that." 

Stiles scoffs. "Not anymore!" Lydia rolls her eyes. Stiles huffs, and says, "I'll _go back to_ following you, but now I'll be whining. I won't be complimenting your hair or your beauty this time. I will be whining, and whining, and whining, moping and begging and pleading and weeping and moaning and, did I mention? Whining, whining, and whining, whining–"

"Stop," she says.

"And whining," Stiles finishes.

She just looks at him, for a long, awful moment. “What is it for?” she asks. He hates that she sounds as cautious as she does.

“A succubus,” he says, because with Lydia he has to be honest. “I’m doing something like _To Catch a Predator_ , except with a boy in drag and a creature of the night.”

“Does Scott know?”

Stiles presses his lips together, and manages not to snap. “Yes.”

"Come over at six," she sighs, finally. Stiles does a completely tasteful and appropriate touchdown dance, and she says, "Stop that. And bring skinny jeans." 

\---

Stiles doesn't own "skinny jeans," at least nothing girly enough for his purposes, which means he has to make a pilgrimage to the nearest H&M and try on girls' pants. 

It seems simple enough, but in the end he has to go back four times for different sizes. The jeans have numbers, same as the men's, but the sizes don't match up. Stiles is a 29, it turns out, which he's pretty sure has nothing to do with inches. 

Once he's picked out a pair of jeans – dark wash, because he's classy – Stiles takes the escalator down to the underwear section. He picks out a pair of underwear that look like they might cover his dick. He isn't sure he'll need them, but he kind of wants them for realism, or something. He draws the line at getting a bra, though, mostly because the sizing is too intimidating for him to take on. 

He folds the underwear into the jeans, and goes to get into line. When he finally reaches the checkout, he blurts, "They're for my girlfriend!" 

The clerk doesn't bother to respond, or even make eye contact. Stiles manages to fork over his cash without any further comment. 

\---

When Lydia opens the door that night, she opens with, "You're going to have to wear Spanx."

"Hello," Stiles says, because he has manners. "I didn't sign up for spanking."

Scott leans past Stiles' shoulder. "Can I watch TV? I'm going to watch TV."

"I wasn't told you'd be here," Lydia says. Stiles looks at her beseechingly; she purses her lips, but says, "All right. You can use the TV in the living room." Scott scampers off, leaving Stiles to his fate. Coward.

Lydia spins neatly on her heel and leads the way up the stairs. Stiles follows, saying plaintively, "Spanks?"

“Spanx,” she says, somehow conveying the ‘x.’ "It's a compression undergarment."

"That sounds unpleasant."

"Welcome to cross-dressing," she says. "If you don't wear the Spanx, you have to tuck."

"Tuck?" Stiles says. He sounds like a parrot.

"Tuck your penis, between your legs," she says. There's a mean light in her eye. "Like a tail."

"Wait, whoa, where?" Lydia opens her mouth, probably to repeat herself, so Stiles adds, "I am not a dog, and my penis, my penis is not actually a tail. It goes in the _front_. Like a penis. A tail goes in the _back_." 

"Which means Spanx," Lydia says. She plucks the plastic bag out of Stiles's arms. "Ugh, H&M. You're not eurotrash, Stiles."

"No, I'm poor," Stiles says.

"How sad for you," Lydia says, but she smiles, almost fondly. She pulls everything out of the bag, rips the tags off, and shoves them into his arms. "I suppose it can't be helped. Go get changed. The Spanx are on the vanity." 

He doesn't like where this is going, but Stiles does as he's told. 

Lydia's bathroom is tastefully beige. The hand towels match the bath towels, which match the bathmat, which matches the shower curtain, which matches the tile. The dark-colored clothes on the vanity stand out starkly against it all.

There's an enormous, terrifyingly clean full-length mirror on one wall, and another, only slightly smaller mirror over the sink. Stiles turns his back on both of them when he starts undressing; if he sees himself he might lose his nerve. This is a lot weirder than he predicted.

"Okay," he says. "Okay." 

He undresses as slowly as he can. He unties his shoes before he toes them off, and tucks his socks into his shoes. He folds his jeans, then his shirt, and then his boxer-briefs, making a neat uniform stack next to his shoes on the floor. Eventually, though, he has to turn toward the sink to get his new clothes. 

Stiles is used to being naked. He’s almost always naked when he can be, because fuck the tyranny of clothes. It’s been a while since he’s really studied himself naked, though.

Stiles used to feel anxious in the locker room, worried that guys would make fun of his lack of pubes or his soft nipples or his too-narrow hips. He looked like a girl, he thought, especially compared to the sculpted dudes he goes to school with. He's filled out, though, post-werewolf. His shoulders are broad, and his forearms are muscular.

"This would have worked better two years ago," he says to the mirror. He raises his voice and calls, "This would have worked better two years ago!" 

"Puberty's a cruel mistress," Lydia says. The doorknob turns. "Are you done?"

"No!" he yelps. "One second!"

"You have a minute," she says.

Stiles knows better than to think she's kidding. It spurs him into motion, at least. He yanks on the underpants, tucking his cock and balls under the fake satin as best he can. His balls barely cooperate; there isn't enough room in the front for any sort of extra baggage, and he ends up having to shove his dick towards his hip. 

He looks stupid now. His dick is lumpy under the satin. He feels silly, and too much like a boy. "This isn't going to work," he says.

"Thirty seconds," Lydia says. Stiles gets his ass in gear.

The Spanx are somewhat more complicated. He thinks they're going to be too small, just from looking at them, and they almost are; he has to wrench at them to get them up around his thighs. 

He’s only gotten them up around his hips when Lydia opens the door. "These are horrible," Stiles says, still hauling away at the waistband. It's cutting into his stomach.

"Here," Lydia says. She steps up behind him, gets her fingers into the fabric, and starts yanking it around. Stiles has to brace himself on the sink, hanging onto the lip for dear life. Lydia's stronger than she looks.

When Lydia's done, though, he's slightly more comfortable. He isn’t aware of the position of his liver anymore, which is good. He shouldn’t be able to feel his liver. 

It takes him another minute to prod his dick into something like an acceptable location. Lydia watches him do it with an air of consternation, like she's watching Prada take a shit. It's more than a little demoralizing, but his need to have his dick unfolded wins out. 

When he's finally got himself arranged, he's able to stop and feel it. It feels weird, of course, but not as bad as he thought it would. It's like something about him has been squeezed down and contained. He doesn't _like_ it, but it feels kind of interesting, not quite painful. 

"Good," Lydia says, like she can read his mind. Maybe she can– it would be just like her to hide some aspect of being a banshee from them. Stiles files that away for later investigation, and snags the jeans off of the sink and finally gets to put them on. 

His reflection in the mirror is freaky. There are pads on his thighs, which manufacture something like womanly curves for him. The freakiest part, though, is his dick. 

His dick has been his best friend, since he and it were both very small. They grew especially close once he discovered the glories of self-abuse, and their relationship is, to this day, one of the strongest and best in Stiles's life. His dick hasn’t always been a good friend to him, what with anger boners and "oh there's a breeze" boners and that one boner at a funeral, but his occasional frustration with his dick has never put a dent in Stiles's love.

And now it's gone. Well, not really gone, obviously, but he can't see it. The jeans look wrong on him, flat where there should be a lump. The fabric is too tight and smooth around his crotch. Stiles slides his hand down over the fly, half to smooth it down, half to feel how alien it is. 

"The fuck," he says, softly. "My dick is gone."

"Were you using it?" Lydia asks, faux-innocently.

"Oh my god." Stiles looks beseechingly at the ceiling. "I can't even look to my dick for consolation. How is this living?"

"I feel for you," Lydia tells him, and takes hold of his wrist. "Come on. Time for a camisole."

The camisole is purple, and has a "built-in bra." This makes it sound like a feat of structural engineering, but instead just means that there's an extra flap of fabric. After he puts it on, Lydia reaches in the front of the shirt, ignoring his squawk, and shoves two pieces of floppy plastic in the flap. 

Stiles looks down. He’s got two barely-noticeable lumps on his chest. "Is that all the boobs I’m getting?" 

"Are you trying to look like a cross dresser?" Lydia asks.

"What? No."

"Then yes, that's all the boob you get.”

"So I have tiny boobs," Stiles says.

"Tiny boobs," Lydia agrees. "Trying to put big breasts on you would look wrong."

"Because I'm a boy," Stiles agrees.

"Because you're a skinny butch lesbian," Lydia says. "Also you would manage to lose bigger ones, somehow."

Stiles struggles with it for a moment, but eventually concedes. "That's fair."

"You would light them on fire," Lydia continues.

"Also fair." At least Stiles gets a smile out of Lydia for that. 

“Okay,” she says, “sit down. We have to deal with your pores.” 

Sitting down is a little uncomfortable, what with his dick mashed against his body. He has to lean forward and cross his legs to put his weight to one side. 

He thinks he'll only have to put up with it for a minute, but then it turns out that foundation isn't as simple as the bottle made it sound at the store. There's base and primer first; only then does he get foundation. Then there's concealer–

"Always use concealer after foundation, otherwise you might overdo it and look cakey," Lydia says, absently.

"I am wearing fourteen layers of greasepaint on my face," Stiles points out, "And I'm worried about looking cakey?"

"Stop moving," she snaps.

–and finally, finally, powder, which makes his eyes itch. 

"Okay," Lydia says. "This is the starting point." She turns the small mirror toward him.

Stiles blinks at himself. What she's done, apparently, is make his face flat and featureless. The hollows under his eyes are gone, now the same pale pinkish white as his cheekbones. His moles are almost gone, though a few still stubbornly break through the surface. There aren't any pores, or patches, no evidence of any hair he might be inclined to grow. 

"My cheekbones are gone," he says. "You took my dick, now my cheekbones?" 

"They’ll be back later," she says. It's almost kind. 

He has to deal with blush, then – which he supposes is how he's regaining his cheekbones – and several flinch-inducing pencils and brushes in his eyes. 

For all the downsides, there's at least one thing that's good. In order to put on someone else's makeup, it turns out, you have to sit incredibly close to them. It's the most intimate that Stiles and Lydia have ever been, despite the years that Stiles has been panting after her. He can feel her breath on his eyelids, his cheekbones. It smells a little like oranges. He thinks about her eating one, pulling a slice, looking at her watch, waiting for him. She’s not for him, not anymore, but it’s still a sweet distraction.

After his eyes, Lydia smears lipstick on his mouth, and then lipgloss. She presses the brush for the lipgloss more firmly than he would have expected; it drags the skin sideways a little in its wake, even though the gloss is slick. 

When she's done, finally, Stiles says, "That was a lot of paint." It comes out without a whole lot of consonants; he's trying to talk without pressing his lips together. 

"You can let your lips touch," Lydia says. "Press them together, and rub them back and forth." She demonstrates, and Stiles follows along dumbly. The layer of lipstick she put on first made his mouth feel tight and dry. The gloss made it sticky and grainy. His face feels oily, and he can see his eyelashes. He's not sure how girls like Lydia do this every day.

"So this is supposed to be the 'natural look,'" he says doubtfully.

"Very natural," Lydia says.

"I'm glad we didn't go for unnatural," he says. "I feel like an oil painting. Also, I think I have mascara in my eye, it hurts. If you gave me pinkeye, I want you to know I'll be incredibly miserable at you."

Lydia just looks at him. She's seeing him, Stiles thinks. Years of trying, and all it took was putting on a mask. 

After another still moment, Lydia purses her lips. Somehow, Stiles can tell she's not really looking at him anymore. "You're not completely hideous with it on," she says. 

"Thanks."

"I'm a miracle worker," she says drily. "Now look at yourself."

Stiles looks, obedient as ever. A woman looks back at him.

His skin is smoother, and his mouth and eyes have gotten bigger. His face looking that way somehow makes his collarbones stand out, his chest more concave, his shoulders a tiny bit rounder. "This is fucked up," he says.

"Stand up," Lydia says, ignoring him entirely. When he’s obediently stood up, she says, "Put your hands in your pockets– no, your back pockets. Don't brace your shoulders up, drop them down. Press one side of your lips together—bite the one side, on the inside. Yeah." She stands up, next to him, and presses one shoulder even further down. "Now tilt your head down, look up through your eyelashes." 

He looks like a girl. She's a little too big in the shoulders, and scary enough that Stiles wouldn't want to hit on her, but– she's a girl. Stiles swallows against the tight feeling in his throat, and says, "Am I supposed to just stand like this the entire time?" he asks. It comes out a little garbled, what with the angle of his throat and him biting his lip. 

It breaks the tension, at least. Lydia sighs. "No," she says. "But if someone looks suspicious, maybe try that."

She has him put on his shoes, and then leads him down the hall to her bedroom, where she has clothes laid out. "Overshirt," she says. Stiles grabs it, happy for another layer. It turns out to be a false hope, though; the neckline is too big, and it slides down over his shoulder. He tries to hitch it up, and it just falls down again. "Stop that. Let it fall," Lydia says. 

"Because I can't buy clothes that fit?"

"Because you're showing collarbone," Lydia says. 

"So. Um. How should I talk?"

"Talk the way you always do," Lydia says.

"What, like a boy?" Stiles feels like he has to emphasize this. 

“No, like a girl with a deep voice,” she says. “It’s about belief–"

“Okay, fine,” Stiles says, flapping his hand to wave off the lecture.

"You shouldn’t interrupt people, if that's possible," Lydia says drily. She turns away and goes back to the clothes on the bed. "I know you won't be able to resist saying something, but go for the mysterious approach."

"Mysterious, I can do that," Stiles says, and ignores Lydia's snort.

"Okay, come on," Lydia says, when she's finally put everything away. "Let's go greet your adoring public."

"Scott?" Stiles scoffs. "He really doesn't count as the public." 

"It's all you're going to get."

"Fair."

Lydia stops him before he can head down the steps. "No, you need to make an entrance."

"Is that a girl thing?"

She rolls her eyes. "It's a makeover thing." 

"Like _She's All That_ ," Stiles says. "Holy shit, I'm Laney Boggs. Is Scott the boy? Is he Freddie Prinze, Jr.? I don't know how I feel about that."

Lydia just huffs and starts walking down the stairs. 

Stiles follows her, helplessly. He doesn't get his stairway entrance like Laney, which at least means that he doesn't take a pratfall halfway down. They have to walk into the den, where Scott is sprawled out on the couch. And, Stiles realizes, where Derek is standing.

Oh, fuck. Derek is Freddie Prinze, Jr. This is going to be painful.

Derek looks up before he can flee, though. Stiles shoves his hands in his front pockets, then in his back pockets when they prove too tiny to hold his hands. "So," he says brightly, when neither Scott nor Derek speaks. “What are you doing here?”

“Gremlins,” Scott says. “There’s a colony trying to move in. Derek’s trying to handle them.” 

“Oh," Stiles says. He nearly bites his lip, before he remembers the lipgloss.

"What are you doing?" Derek asks. He’s sweaty, and there’s dirt on the knees of his jeans and streaked across his shirt. He doesn’t really look like Freddie Prinze, Jr. He looks better, the asshole.

His mouth hasn't dropped open, either. His mouth was supposed to drop open, Stiles thinks. Instead his lips have thinned. Stiles' life really isn't fair at all. 

"You look nice," Scott says, solidifying his position as Best Friend in the World. "Very lesbian."

"Thank you," Stiles says. He looks pointedly at Derek, but Derek just scowls at him. It feels like they've stepped back in time two years. "Derek?" he prompts.

Derek's scowl doesn't waver. "What is this for?" 

"Stiles is catching a succubus," Scott says. 

"Threatening a succubus," Stiles says. "I'm freelancing, it's going to be great."

"Why wasn't I told?" Derek says. He turns to Scott, like he's dismissing Stiles entirely.

"Excuse me," Stiles says. "You aren't the alpha here, anymore." Derek's shoulders get even more tense, and Stiles has to swallow before he continues. "And I wanted to do this on my own, which means that I told my alpha, and he said I could, so I did it."

"This isn't safe," Derek says, still speaking to Scott. "Succubi are–"

"It's one succubus," Stiles protests. "It's one woman, who I am going to tell to leave town." Derek opens his mouth, and Stiles barrels on, "I swear I will call in the cavalry if she tries to, I don't know, bite my face off."

"Seduce you," Derek snarls, finally turning to look at him. "They have pheromones, you won't be immune–"

"I can handle this," Stiles yells. "Let me fucking handle this!"

Derek's lip curls up, almost a snarl. "Fine," he says, grudgingly. 

"Fine," Stiles says pointedly. "So glad we talked about this, you massive asshole."

Derek just turns on his heel and stalks out of the house. He slams the door shut behind him.

They stand in silence for a moment, and then Lydia says. "All of this drama needs to exit my home."

"Ugh," Stiles says. "Come on, Scott, let's do this."

"You really are a very pretty lesbian," Scott says, as they're walking out the door.

" _Thank you_ ," Stiles says. "At least someone here has manners." He says it loud enough that Derek could hear, if he hung around. Stiles hopes he hung around.

\---

On the way over, Stiles can’t stop shifting in his seat. "My balls are pretty achy already," he tells Scott. “This might be ugly.”

Scott grimaces. "Yeah, I thought it would hurt. Did you really have to put on the spanky stuff?"

"Yeah. They're like bicycle shorts, but tighter. I can feel my heartbeat in my nuts." Stiles pulls at the crotch of his jeans. It doesn't do anything, of course, but at least it feels like he's doing something. The car goes over a bump in the road, and Stiles makes a high-pitched noise. "Careful!"

"I'm driving as carefully as I can!" Scott says.

"Drive carefuller, dude, your godchildren are at stake here." Stiles braces himself on the door and lifts himself up as they approach another pothole. "And you should get your shocks looked at."

"You're one to talk," Scott says.

"Jeeps aren't supposed to have shocks," Stiles says loftily. Scott just shakes his head.

The bar, when they get there, doesn't look like anything special. Stiles peers out the car window at the front of it. "That's the place, apparently," he says.

"Looks normal enough," Scott says. He leans over to look, too.

"Yeah," Stiles says, unnecessarily. It seems more real now that he's sitting outside it, looking at the neon beer signs in the muddy-looking window. He rubs his hands against his thighs, drying them off. His face still feels like it's coated in oil and grit; he wants to wipe at his eyes and his cheeks, but he can't. "I should have tried to find a real lesbian," he says.

"You want to bail?" Scott asks, loyal as always. "We can come up with another plan."

"No," Stiles says. He takes a deep breath and says, "No, I put on a 'compression undergarment' for this. I might as well go in there."

"If you're sure," Scott says. Stiles nods. "Okay, well. Go get us a succubus, or whatever."

"Finstock gives better pep talks than you do," Stiles says, but he gets out of the car. He leans back in to grab the silver knife out of the cupholder, and wiggles around until he can shove it down underneath the Spanx. It slides in his sweat – because of course he's already sweating – and the handle very nearly plunges down his asscrack. "Okay. Wish me luck."

"You'll be great," Scott says.

It's a short walk to the front door of the bar, too short. Stiles dries his palms on his jeans one last time, and grabs the handle. "Just tough it out," he tells himself. He chances a look back.

Scott gives him a thumbs up. He's grinning.

It's more heartening than it should be. Scott is the one waiting in the car. Stiles isn't the chauffeur this time. He might even get to be the hero.

A hero with his balls cramped in satin and spandex, Stiles thinks, is still a hero. Batman wears black spandex panties, after all. Stiles is following in a fine tradition.

Stiles yanks at the fabric binding his crotch one more time, grabs the door handle, and goes in.

There's a small passageway just inside the front door, with another door blocking the way into the bar itself. The bouncer is perched on a stool just inside of the front door, and Stiles nearly bowls him over when he gets in. Stiles flails wildly and manages to keep himself upright by sheer determination. The bouncer gives him a vague sort of smile.

"Hi," Stiles says brightly.

"ID?" the bouncer says.

"Right, of course," Stiles says. "ID, of course, need ID to get into a bar. Completely forgot!" Stiles has his fake ID wedged into one of the tiny front pockets in his jeans, along with his debit card, a couple of twenties and a chapstick. He has to dig around for a little bit to get it out, in spite of how small the pocket is. "This is awkward, huh," Stiles says. 

The bouncer gazes at him implacably.

Stiles finally gets his ID sorted out from everything else, and hands it over triumphantly. He then realizes, in a moment of sickening clarity, that he just handed over an ID with the sex very clearly marked as male.

The bouncer squints at his ID. He looks up at Stiles. Stiles smiles at him, gamely, but it probably comes out as a grimace. The bouncer looks back down at the ID, and hands it back to Stiles. Stiles' fingers slip on the plastic when he takes it. "So," he says, preparing himself to deploy some serious defensive babble.

"You look pretty," the bouncer says.

"What?"

"I like your shirt," the bouncer says. When Stiles just gapes at him, the guy almost smiles. "It's very pretty on you, you look very– pretty."

"I– thank you," Stiles says. "You look nice too?"

"Okay, sure," the bouncer says. "Go ahead, kid."

"Okay," Stiles says. "Thank you, again. For the compliment. Very nice."

"Go," the bouncer says pointedly. Stiles goes. He knows that tone of voice way too well.

Hauling the second door open makes it seem like Stiles is trying to make an entrance. He feels like the music should stop, and the patrons should all turn to look at him. Neither happens, of course. One woman looks over at him, but it's brief and dismissive. He stands still for a second, unsure of what to do. He's pretty sure he shouldn't block the door, at least, so he walks a little further in, hovering next to the bar with his hands shoved in his back pockets.

He isn't sure what he was expecting, but it wasn't exactly this. He maybe had an image in his head based on the Jungle, even though he should have known they wouldn't be anything alike. This isn't a dance club. The music isn't jacked up like it was at the Jungle, and there's no teeming dance floor. It's just a bar, albeit a bar filled with women. That's what's distinctive about it, really; Stiles has never seen a place so full of just women.

There's some jangling song on the jukebox, barely loud enough to be heard over the hum of conversation. Everyone is talking to one another, like they know each other already. At Jungle, Stiles had at least been able to dance; he met a couple of people there just by making eye contact with them. No one's making eye contact with him here. They all seem to know one another, and none of them are willing to pull him into their group.

He can't really spy anyone who looks like a succubus, either, although he's not sure how he'll be able to tell. After a minute of fruitless leaning and looking, Stiles straightens up, edges around a little knot of women, and walks further into the room, following the line of the bar.

The bartender is at the far end, talking to a woman with tattoos and a really edgy hairdo. Stiles hovers there, aiming for eye contact, but the two women are deep in conversation. Stiles is about to give up when someone leans into his side and says, "Lisa's kind of lazy. You'll have to say something."

"Oh," Stiles says. 

"Lisa!" the stranger says. “Do your damn job. The lady needs a drink.”

"Shut up," Lisa says. “Fine, what do you want?” 

"The usual. And this one wants–" The stranger looks at Stiles expectantly.

"A Coke," he says.

"Aw, come on. What're you, Mormon?"

"Mormons have historically preferred not to drink caffeine," Stiles says, stupidly. He wrote an essay on this, though, so he has to elaborate. "The church recently changed their minds, but it’s still common for devout members of the faith to abstain, according to anecdotal evidence on forums. So I could be, I guess. But I’m not."

The stranger and Lisa both laugh, and Stiles feels his cheeks flush a little with pleasure. The stranger says, "She'll have a Coke, then. I'm Jennie, by the way." 

"Hi Jennie," Stiles says. "I'm– Stiles."

He has another a moment of panic, thinking that the jig is up – he didn't come up with a girl name, what a stupid, stupid move, he's going to get outed before he even got a chance to look around – but Jennie just says, "Did you play field hockey?"

"Lacrosse," Stiles says, automatically. "I play lacrosse."

"I figured it was a sport," Jennie says. "Athletes always have those weird nicknames. Come on, Stiles, come and sit with me."

Stiles lets Jennie pay for his drink, lets her grab his elbow and lead him back to her table. She's sitting with four other women, all at one table. Stiles slides in, careful of his drink, and Jennie squeezes in after him. Jennie's not the succubus, Stiles is pretty sure of that, but it's nice to be with somebody in this insular group, talking to someone instead of standing alone by the bar.

Jennie introduces him – "she goes by 'Stiles,' she played lacrosse," and they all nod like that’s a thing – but he doesn't get anyone's name in return. They turn seamlessly back to their conversation instead, which is apparently about a TV show that Stiles has never seen or heard of. The woman across from him is mounting a passionate defense of it, and the rest of them are mocking her. 

 

It makes Stiles feel a little less alien to listen to her talk, even though he's not really included in the conversation. It sounds eerily like any number of conversations Stiles has had with the pack, one of them – usually Stiles, if he's being honest – ranting about something, with the others talking shit when he pauses for breath. 

The conversation has all sorts of undertones, though, much like conversations in the pack have. Stiles can tell when they're Not Mentioning Something; they sound a little bit like when someone Doesn't Mention Erica or Boyd. There are a couple of inside jokes, phrases they drop in the middle of the conversation that sound familiar and well-worn, even if they don't necessarily get a laugh. One thing Stiles can definitely understand, though, is the way that the woman to his left elbow looks at him when Jennie murmurs something in his ear. She's jealous, he thinks, most likely jealous of Stiles. 

Stiles is sweaty. He keeps almost-forgetting to be a girl, almost spreading his knees too far apart, or almost interrupting someone's sentences. The silver knife is digging into the small of his back. The woman to his left is giving him nastier and nastier looks, even though Stiles isn't responding to Jennie's advances at all.

When Jennie puts her arm across the back of the booth, Stiles is finally spurred into action. "I have to pee," he says. "Do you mind scooting over?"

Jennie scoots obediently. 

"While you're up," the woman to his left says, and slides out after Stiles.

"You have a bladder the size of a pea," Jennie says. The woman just rolls her eyes.

They're silent on the way to the bathroom, but when they get to the door the woman says, "Jennie likes fresh meat."

"Okay," Stiles says, after a beat. "That makes sense."

The woman purses her lips, but she doesn't say anything else, just elbows her way into a stall. Stiles does the same, picking a stall a few doors away just in case. 

He takes a few moments when he's safely locked inside, taking deep breaths. He's let himself get distracted. He needs to get out there, and he needs to get back in circulation.

He really does have to pee, though. 

The bathroom is a pain. Stiles bangs his elbow into the stall wall, and nearly jams one of his fingers, but he manages to get his dick out to piss. Tucking himself back in is a whole other production – he almost drops the silver knife when he's hauling the Spanx back around his middle – and he's exhausted by the time he's finally exiting the bathroom. He leans against the wall next to the bathroom door and pulls his phone out of his back pocket to text Scott. He types out _Dude I think_ before someone leans into his space.

"Hello," she says.

Stiles looks up, ready to tell her to back the fuck off, and stops.

"Hi," he says, instead. He almost says _you’re the succubus, huh_ , but manages to restrain himself to "Oh, wow," instead. She’s definitely the succubus, though. Stiles’ dick is valiantly trying to get hard, in spite of the compression, and his heart is going triple-time, thumping madly in his chest. All he can smell is a salty-warm smell like the ocean, sea-water and sand.

She's beautiful, of course. What's really startling, though, are the ways that she isn't beautiful. He was expecting someone like Catharine Zeta-Jones, dark eyes and red lips and flowing wavy tresses. She's not that. Her eyes are a muddy sort of dark brown. Her lips are chapped. She's got her hair up in a messy sort of bun.

She's fucking beautiful. 

"You're really, really, really pretty," Stiles tells her, because he hasn't met a stupid thought he can't blurt. She laughs like she's a stock photo model, tossing her hair back and opening her mouth wide. Her teeth are really white. "I can't believe how pretty you are," Stiles adds. 

"You're pretty, too," she says. "What's your name?"

"Stiles," he says, too honest. "My name's Stiles. What's your name?"

"It’s May."

"May," he says dumbly. "That's a really pretty name, May."

“Thanks, I picked it myself,” she says. “Would you like to go outside with me?" 

Stiles says, "Yes, immediately."

Scott’s sitting out front. Stiles is supposed to lure her out front. Whatever, though– it'll be fine, it always turns out fine. 

It's cooler outside. It's almost enough to shock Stiles back into awareness– not quite enough, though, because she’s leaned back into him, pressing him up against the wall.

“I want to kiss you.”

“Fuck yes,” Stiles says, then catches himself. “Uh, we–" 

She interrupts by cupping his head, tilting it up, and kissing him. Her mouth is soft and wet, and she's humming into his mouth, curling her hands over his hips and tugging him closer, pressing their bodies together.

Stiles should probably care that he's getting light-headed, but he doesn’t really want to care.

Stiles slouches down against the wall to bring his mouth down to her height. She straightens up, and she's even a little taller than him. She sweeps her hand down his back, shaping him into a curve against her body. Stiles is pretty sure he should be doing something sexy with his hands, but he's unable to think of anything. He manages to get them up onto her shoulders, and then he just clings, letting her guide him.

When she pulls back, he makes a really stupid noise. 

She laughs, and kisses him again, just a little catch-and-release. She palms the curve of his skull, then rakes her nails back up, against the grain of his hair. Stiles gasps against her mouth. His head tips back and his hips jolt forward. 

The point of the silver knife digs into the crack of his ass with the movement. It's sharp and awful – he might have jabbed a hole in his asscrack, jesus – but it snaps him out of it. He's suddenly clear-headed enough to realize that his hands are shaking, that he's panting for air, that his heart is going a mile a minute. He pulls away from her, twisting his head slightly.

"So, May," he says. "You're a succubus."

Just like that, she's got her hands around his neck, her claws digging in. Her eyes are bright green, now, too bright to be human. "So," she says. "You have a death wish."

"It's like you know me," Stiles says. "I would think we were a match made in heaven, except for the succubus thing. Well, and I'm also a boy."

She blinks, slowly. Stiles is pretty sure she has two sets of eyelids. "Pardon me?"

"I'm a boy. You're a lesbian succubus–"

"Sex demon," she says.

"Pardon?"

"Sex demon," she repeats, almost patiently. "Not precisely a succubus."

"Huh," Stiles says. He pauses, considers, and says, "Well, the point stands. You're a really good kisser, I can't stress that enough, but it's not going to work out."

She doesn't move, but she loosens her grip on his throat. "What exactly are you trying to achieve?" she asks.

"I was just going to warn you off," he says apologetically. "I wasn't planning on kissing you. Bad form, I know, but then you were all with the pheromones and the prettiness and so on. Not that I'm blaming you! I'm just young, and impressionable. My frontal lobe won't be fully developed until I'm twenty-six, did you know that? It's why teenagers are so impulsive. I'm very impulsive. Which is why I kissed you."

"All right," she says.

"All right," he repeats. "Yeah, so I'm sorry. But– right, warning you. You should split town."

"And why’s that?" 

"This is a werewolf town. There's a pack in Beacon Hills, and you're in the greater Beacon Hills area. They're sort of territorial, werewolves."

"You're not a werewolf, though," she says. Her hands have slid down a little, resting against his collarbones. "I would have tasted it."

"No, not a werewolf. Werewolf-adjacent. But part of the pack, sort of, which is why I'm here. I have a silver knife, I was going to do a Hail Mary in Latin. It was going to be very intense."

"I’m sure." Her mouth tilts up at the corner, finally, and her eyes bleed back to muddy brown. "I suppose werewolves don't want a succubus around, then?"

"You've been running through the local lesbians," Stiles says. "You're depleting our natural resources. It's kind of noticeable, and we're pretty invested in not being noticed."

She almost looks hurt. "I didn't kiss anyone who didn't want it. And I don't really hurt them. It’s just a tiny thing. I didn’t hurt you."

"Oh," Stiles says. He pauses. "I didn't think of that. That's good, though. Good to know."

She smiles, then, and tilts her head like she's considering him. "So you came here dressed as a girl to get me to stop feeding? Very heroic."

"Thank you," Stiles says. "That was the aim. Fighting for the good and right, theme song in the background, all that shit."

She laughs, again. She's laughing at him, obviously, but Stiles is pretty pleased with himself nonetheless. He kissed a sex demon, and then made her laugh. He's doing pretty well, he thinks.

She tilts his chin up, then, and considers him. After a moment, she says, "I have an idea.”

“Okay, hit me with it.”

“What if I picked someone up for longer than a night?"

Stiles licks his lips. He's trying to think of another implication for the question, but he can't. He clears his throat. "You mean me, right?"

"Yes, I mean you," she says. "I don't need to feed every night, not really. Maybe once, twice a week. I could feed on the same person."

"I'm a boy," he reminds her. "My dick is pretty cramped right now, but it's there."

"I know," she says. "It’s fine. Nice, really." She kisses him again, like she's trying to convince him– like he's the one who needs to be convinced. Stiles groans and clutches at her shirt. His knuckles skim against the underside of her breasts. 

"Fuck," Stiles says, when she pulls back. The word gets all mangled in his mouth. "Would it be a contract, then, or what?"

"Or what," she says, amused. "We could date, Stiles."

"You want to take me out on a date," Stiles says blankly.

"Yes," she says, with exaggerated patience. "Do you want to go steady?"

And, well. Stiles should probably say no. She’s a sex demon, which has never been on his list of desirable qualities in a mate. That’s more Derek’s speed. There’s the whole “possibly draining your life force” thing. He’ll have to lie to his friends, yet again.

But she’s so beautiful. And she wants him, little old Stiles Stilinski. 

Really, there's only one answer Stiles can possibly give.

\---

It’s way too easy for Stiles to lie, these days. He never should have gotten into the habit, probably, but now it’s too late; he can even lie to werewolves, these days, his heart steady as truth.

"Nothing happened," Stiles tells Scott. "I mean, I saw her, but I didn't even have to use the knife or anything."

"What?" Scott says. "I didn’t hear you, did you come outside?”

"We talked inside," Stiles says, taking the easiest route. "I talked to her. She said she would leave."

"Just like that," Scott says, skeptically.

"I know, dude, I didn't believe it myself. Apparently succubi are easygoing ladies! Who knew. I certainly didn't. I'm going to have to make a note in the spreadsheet. She didn't even use claws or anything– they're supposed to have claws, and tails– she just said ‘oh, didn't realize this was a werewolf town,’ and told me she would peace out." Stiles can feel his heart going a little too fast in his chest, but Scott doesn’t seem to notice. Stiles takes a deep breath in and lets it out, anyway, just in case.

Scott presses his lips together, but he turns on the car. "You believe her?" he asks, and pulls out onto the road.

"I do," Stiles says. He turns his phone over in his hands. "Yeah, I think I do."

\---

"Do you need me to drop you off a block away or something?" Scott asks. When Stiles gives him a weird look, Scott gestures to Stiles' outfit. "I don't know if you want to sneak in, I didn't think you told your dad about all this."

"Oh god, no, I didn't tell him about the succubus-bait thing," Stiles says. "But it's okay. He's got a late shift tonight. You can drop me at the front door."

"Lucky," Scott says.

"I guess so."

When Stiles gets out of the car, Scott says, "I'm glad you did that."

"What?"

"I'm glad you talked to the succubus," Scott says. "We probably would have tried to kill her, or something."

Stiles braces his arm across the top of the passenger door. Between the makeup and his vague feeling of guilt, his smile feels like it's stretched thin. "Sometimes you need a human for the job," he says. "I keep telling you that."

"I always listen," Scott says, earnestly.

"I know, dude," Stiles says. He thumps the top of the car with his fist. "I'm gonna go, okay? I need to go put some paint thinner on my face, get rid of this crap Lydia put on me."

When he's inside the house, Stiles gives himself a minute to rest against the inside of the front door. He has to give himself a pep talk before he's able to force himself upright, but eventually he gets himself moving again, trudging up the stairs to the bathroom.

Stripping off his clothes feels ridiculously good; taking a hot shower feels even better. Stiles scrubs his face three or four times, until his skin squeaks a little under his fingertips, and then leans his head against the wall of the shower. He lets the water beat down on him for what feels like an hour, only dragging himself up and out of the shower when it starts to run cool. He kicks the pile of his clothes into his room, and goes to flop on his bed.

Derek is sitting there.

"The fuck," Stiles yelps. He clutches at the towel around his hips, feeling more naked than he should.

"How did it go?"

"It's none of your business," Stiles says. "Oh my god, why did I even answer that? Get the hell out of my room." 

"You're—" Derek hesitates. Something new happens every day, Stiles thinks, and forces himself to keep silent. It takes chewing on his lips. He's rewarded when Derek says, "You dressed like a girl."

"Like a lesbian," Stiles says.

"You looked good," Derek says, and Stiles hesitates, stunned.

"What?" he says, because _what?_ He doesn't let Derek answer that, though. "You like 'em butch, then, huh."

"Not– no," Derek says, which doesn't make any sense. 

Stiles waves his hands like he can swat away all the nonsense. "Whatever. I dressed like a bisexual bar-hopping woman, sue me."

"You're going to get hurt," Derek says tightly. He has a tendency to make random pronouncements, Stiles thinks. "Whatever it is you think you're doing, you need to stop."

"I need to stop what, hitting on lesbians? For the most part, they are a pacifist people. I may have run into a few exceptions—"

"You're up to something," Derek says.

"And you're like the interrupting cow," Stiles says. "You know, 'Interrupting cow, moooo.'"

Derek ignores him, of course. He says, "You smell like fear."

"And you smell like asshole," Stiles spits back. "Now get out of my house, or I swear to god I'll scream. I don't even care right now. Shoo." 

Derek opens his mouth.

"I said _get out_ ," Stiles says, his voice rising. Derek finally goes to the window. He perches for a moment, looking at Stiles, and then he's gone.

Stiles slams down the frame as hard as he can. He rests his hands against the sill for just a moment, catching his breath. "Fucking werewolves," he whispers, and shakes his head.


	2. Chapter 2

When Stiles wakes for the first time, it's already later than he usually lets himself sleep. The house is quiet, and the sunlight through the window has already reached the foot of his desk chair. He rolls onto his back, scratches one armpit, smacks his lips. Closes his eyes.

When he opens his eyes again the shadow from the window has moved across his floor. It has to be past two at least. His head feels muddy from too much sleep, and all he wants is to close his eyes again, but he forces himself to sit up and put his feet on the floor. He braces his elbows on his knees and lets his head hang down between his shoulders, just for a minute, before he pushes himself up and stumbles into the bathroom.

He finally checks the time after he's done pissing and brushing his teeth, and discovers that his internal clock was right. He slept for more than twelve hours. When he picks up his phone, there are three messages waiting: his dad says that he's at the station until five, Scott says that he's playing Diablo, and an unknown number. The unknown number just says, "this is may."

He saves May's number, texts his dad and Scott, and resists the urge to drop into bed again. He goes downstairs instead, makes himself a sandwich and contemplates which of their Lean Cuisine selections he's going to inflict on his dad for dinner that night. His bookbag is where he'd dumped it, gaping open underneath the kitchen table, so he sits down and pulls out his homework for Calc. 

Stiles isn't quite working at full power, but he still feels better than he has in months. He wants to call May and tell her, reassure her that this is a good idea, but he doesn't do it. He has to hold strong, play it at least a little cool. He manages to plow through the Calc problem set, takes some notes for an English in-class essay, but doesn't manage to look at his Western Civ syllabus. It's Saturday– yes, it's Saturday, so he's got another day. 

When his dad gets home, Stiles has their meals heated up, and they have Pomegranate Chicken and Lemongrass Salmon; after dinner he plays Diablo with Scott, and then it's time for bed again. "You've been a little zonked today," his dad says, before Stiles heads up to bed.  


"Long day yesterday," Stiles says. "I'll sleep it off." His dad toasts him, and Stiles escapes.

He doesn't dream that night, at least as far as he can remember the next morning. He wakes up feeling like his normal self again.

He's got another text from May the next morning, just _stiles?_

 _Yeah, sorry._ He chews on his lip for a little while, then adds, _I was trying to play it cool, lol._

She doesn't text back for a while. He puts his phone away at first, tries to focus on homework and video games and, when those fail, some updates to his spreadsheet that he's been meaning to get to for a while. She finally texts him at three, and he scrambles for the phone.

_two can play at that game._

_Oh snap,_ he sends back. She's a jerk, apparently. It's like she was made for him.

_may i call you tonight? 8?_

_Okay._

He has to blow off plans with Scott, but it's not the biggest deal. It isn't like Scott hasn't blown him off before; Stiles is just paying him back. He tells Scott as much, when Scott complains. 

She calls at 8:17. Stiles grabs the phone right away, then lets it ring two more times before he picks up the call. "Hey," he says, trying to sound cool, and immediately ruins the effect by clearing his throat. "You called," he says, and has to resist the urge to slap himself across the face.

"Yes, I called," May says, amused. "I also texted you. I dislike the phone, you should count yourself lucky."

"I do," he says. She laughs, like she thinks he's joking, and he doesn't correct her. "Why do you hate the phone?"

"Newfangled technology," she says. 

It's a little bizarre that he doesn't know if she's joking, either. It gives him an opening, though. "What about movies? You hate those too, or are they old enough for you?"

"Excellent segue," she says, faux approving. "Did you spend much time coming up with that?"

"Nope. I'm quick on my feet."

She's silent for a second. Stiles has his mouth open to– to take his stupid invitation back, or whatever, when she says, "I know there's a joke about sex in 'quick on my feet,' but it's not coming to me."

"Heh, coming."

"Too easy."

"Heh, easy."

"I could hang up," she says, and Stiles yelps, "No!" before he can even think about it. She laughs, again, and says, "Oh, calm yourself. I'd like to see you."

"Right, of course you do," Stiles says, but he has to sit down on the edge of his bed. "So, a movie?"

"A movie. When would you like to meet?"

He opens his mouth again, but can't think of anything. "Shit, I didn't think about that. This Thursday? Next Saturday? Or is that–" He looks around, as though someone might be in the room with him. To be fair, that's happened before. "Is that too long for you to wait? To feed?"

"I'll live," she says drily. After a beat, she adds, "You're a very sweet man, you know that, right?"

"I'm kind of a jackass, most of the time," Stiles tells her.

She just makes a considering noise, then says, "How about on Thursday?"

"Thursday," Stiles agrees. "What do you want to see?"

"I liked the looks of _Mind Matter 2_."

Stiles had been planning to see it with Scott, maybe Scott and Isaac, but they can go see it together. He can tell Scott he's going to see it with his Dad. "Sure," he says. "Yeah, it's– it's a date."

During dinner that night, his dad has to slap his hands two or three times to get them to stop drumming on the table. "You're fully recovered from yesterday," he says wryly. 

"Now you remember that tired me is better," Stiles says. His dad just pats his hand and smiles.

\---

On Thursday, Stiles is a jittery mess. It's not just because of nerves, either; he has to ditch his friends somehow. 

Lydia is the worst one; she wants to go shopping, and get smoothies, and she's suspicious when Stiles doesn't immediately agree. He hates to lie to her, he really does, but– well, she wouldn't understand this time, not like she had about the makeup. This way she has plausible deniability, anyway. He makes up something about time with his dad, and she eventually lets it go, but he's going to have to be careful in the future. 

Even after he dodges everyone, Stiles still has to race home so that he can pick up milk, have dinner with his dad, get changed, and meet May at the movie. He has four hours, admittedly, even after talking to Lydia and driving home, but he has the feeling he'll need at least two hours to freak out over t-shirts.

He ends up choosing a henley thing, something that looks a bit like something that Derek would wear. He's not nearly so ripped as Derek, to be fair, but it still looks okay, he thinks. He drags on a pair of jeans – definitely not skinny at all – and shoves his feet into a pair of less-ratty sneakers.

"Where are you off to?" his dad asks.

"Hanging out with Lydia," he says. "Smoothies and the mall." 

"Tell her hi from me. Don't let her make you buy anything."

"I'll be good," Stiles says.

This is the cycle of his life, Stiles thinks, as he starts up the car. He's finally stopped lying to his dad about werewolves, and he gets involved with a sex demon. He despairs of ever being one hundred percent honest with his father.

He gets to the movie theater half an hour early, and sits in the parking lot for twenty minutes before he decides to go buy the tickets. May is already sitting in the front lobby when he walks in, though. "Shit," Stiles says. "Did you get here early, too?"

"I like the coming attractions," May says. She's already got a box of candy. "I bought you your ticket."

"I was going to get them," Stiles says automatically. She rolls her eyes and passes him the ticket. Their fingers brush, and Stiles feels that stupid zip again. "I wanted to be a big dudely man, don't be a hater."

"You were wearing quite a lot of makeup when I met you, 'big dudely man,'" she says. She does have a point, so Stiles shrugs and doesn't push his luck.

They're early even for the previews. While the lights are still up, they talk idly about movies they want to see. It's hard to stay calm. May is just as beautiful as he remembers her, maybe more. She's got a mean sense of humor, and a stuttering, strange laugh. Her hair is tangled in a braid, and her eye makeup is smudged at the corners, and her shirt collar droops down one shoulder; she looks messy and sly and wonderful, like every kind of good time. He's kind of disappointed when the previews start and he has to face forward.

\---

The time spent not looking at her, though, is made up for by the movie. The movie is, in a word, awesome. In a phrase, it is "fucking awesome."

"That was _awful_ ," May says.

"What?" Stiles squawks. He flings his arms up in the air, as that is the only way he can fully and completely express his anger. "What? How are you so wrong? What movie did you see? Did you sneak out and see that shitty romcom while I wasn't looking?"

"No, I watched that incredibly dull movie. While you were masturbating, it seems. Were you watching that dreck?"

Stiles stares at her, genuinely agog. This is what agog feels like, he realizes, and takes note of the feeling for future reference. "Did you not just see that trial by fire?" he asks. "That _bildungsroman_? That young man's quest to find the strength hidden at his very core?"

"A white boy finds himself. I have never seen that in the entire history of cinema," she says.

"Oh, sure, take refuge in snide comments, that makes sense. Ignore the entire arc of the plot, which absolutely nailed the experience of a young man trying to survive in a strange world, and actually took into account the collateral damage on his life. Sure. Go ahead with that, that makes sense."

"Pardon me? By 'collateral damage,' would you mean the part where he got a D on a test? That's not collateral damage, that's a normal life experience." She points at him with an imperious expression. "We're going for a walk now, and we're talking about this until you realize how wrong you are."

"So until I have a psychotic break. Might be a long walk," Stiles says. She marches off, away from the parking lot, and Stiles follows her again.

They proceed to discuss:

  * The plot, which is a masterpiece of continuity and certainly does not have holes the size of the Chunnel, 
  * The importance of robot explosions to character development, and how they should be included in all movies forever, _yes, even Werner Herzog movies,_
  * The importance of representation of white men, which– okay, does make Stiles feel a little weird to argue, but whatever, he can't show weakness, 
  * The antagonist, who wasn't a fucking stereotype, a stereotype of what? Of badassery?



"Go fuck yourself," Stiles finally snarls.

"Temper, temper," she says, maddeningly cool about it.

Stiles makes a noise that, if forced, he would admit sounds like a dying badger. He pitches his soda to the ground to underscore his frustration.

The soda cup bounces, rolls, and lands in the creek.

"We're at the creek," he says, dumbly.

"Yeah," she says, looking around.

"The creek is maybe a mile away from the movie theater," Stiles says.

She blinks at him. "Oh dear," she says. She sucks on her straw, and the cup makes a rattling noise. "And I finished my drink."

"I just threw mine in the mud, or I'd offer you some."

"No need to be gentlemanly." She cranes her neck to look down at the creek. "You should probably go pick that up, though."

"Yeah."Stiles sighs, and bends down to roll up his pants legs. The cup isn't too far down, at least, and he only gets a little mud on his sneakers. He got a lot better at climbing after the bulette attack. He climbs back up, grabbing gratefully for May's hand when she offers it. "That was a really dumb gesture," he says, waggling the cup.

"Yeah, it was," she says, smirking. Stiles rolls his eyes. "Now, come here."

"Uh– I'm here already."

She sighs and grabs his shirt, pulling him up close. His soda cup gets smushed between them, which is a small price to pay for having his hand crushed against her breasts. "No. Come _here_ ," she says, and kisses him.

Stiles makes a stupid noise into her mouth, but he kisses her back. He hadn't realized he was chilly, but she's incredibly warm against him, and her mouth feels burning hot. She's digging one hand into his lower back, just above his ass; her claws are pinpricks, a perfect counterbalance to the slow press of her tongue. 

Stiles works his hand out from between them, drops his soda cup on the ground, and pulls away enough to gasp, "Please, please let me touch your breasts."

"Shut up," she says, and drags her hand up his back to fist it in his hair, yanking his mouth back against hers. Stiles doesn't want to examine why that gets him so hot, so he doesn't; he just curves one hand over her breast. It's heavy against the heel of his hand. He hears her cup hit the ground, and she grabs his hand, forcing his fingers to close harder around her breast. Stiles makes an involuntary noise, more a high whine than anything else, and gives in, letting her use his mouth and his hand.

When she pulls away from him, Stiles sways toward her, chasing her mouth again. She shakes her head, though, and holds him back. "We've got a long walk," she murmurs. "I don't want you to pass out."

When she says, he can feel how his hand is shaking, feel the way he's locked his knees to keep from pitching over. "One more," he says, and the words come out slurred. 

She shakes her head. "Grab the cups." Stiles nearly pitches over when he reaches down to get them, and she steadies him with hands on his hips. He nearly goes to his knees when he straightens back up, but she keeps him upright. He stumbles against her, and she shores him up. "Come on," she says. "I'll lead you back."

She talks to him steadily on the way back. It's hard to pay attention. His head is swimming. The path yaws back and forth in front of him. She keeps talking and tugging him along, though, and he keeps putting one foot in front of the other.

"Sorry I'm like this," Stiles says.

She looks back at him. Her skin seems to glow a little in the moonlight, and it hurts Stiles' eyes. "Please don't say you're sorry," she says.

"Sorry," Stiles says, and then claps his hand over his mouth.

She smiles, reluctantly. "It's my fault."

"Not your fault. I wanted– I wanted to. I want to. Still want to."

"At least three-quarters my fault."

Stiles shakes his head, and regrets it almost immediately. "I wanted to," he repeats.

"Thank you," she says, softly. "At any rate."

When they get to his car, she leans him up against it and digs for his keys, fishing around in his pocket. He tries vaguely to touch her, in response, but she keeps batting his hands away. When she's dragged the keys out of his pocket, she unlocks the passenger door and helps him onto the seat. "Wait here," she says. "Wait right here, don't move."

"Okay," he says. He leans his head against the back of the seat, suddenly and awfully tired. His vision is smearing, transforming the parking lot into streaking color and light. It hurts his eyes, so he closes them, just to let his vision calm down.

He startles awake when she tugs on his arm, and nearly tips out of the car. She catches him, holds him up again, and presses a bottle of apple juice into his hand. "Drink," she says. Stiles fumbles the cap off and drinks. It helps. His stomach settles a little, and he can keep his eyes open.

"Yeah, I think we overdid it a little." He gulps down more juice, spilling a little bit on his chest. 

"You think? I'm driving you home."

"I think I can do it," Stiles says, but she just shakes her head and goes around to the driver's side.

On the way home, she says, "I'm sorry I lost control like that."

"My life is pretty much made up of supernatural creatures losing control around me," Stiles says. He realizes a beat later that that statement is entirely too true. "But I think we just need to practice."

She's silent for the rest of the drive, but when they get to his house, when she's sliding out of his car, she turns and says, "Sunday. Meet me Sunday. I'll make you dinner."

Stiles opens the door and and awkwardly slithers out. "Sunday," he says. "How are you getting home?"

"I live right near here." She gestures vaguely in the direction of Parrish Street. "I'll text you the address."

"Okay," he says. He watches her walk away, silhouetted in the light cast by the streetlamp. "I had fun!" he yells, after she's gone a block or so.

She turns back and smiles at him. Her eyes are bright and her teeth are sharp. 

She's so beautiful, Stiles thinks, and goes to let himself into the house.

\---

The next day is rough. Stiles wakes up groggy, like he's taken a too-short nap, even though he slept for nine hours. On his way out of his room, he trips over nothing and smacks into the doorjamb, hard enough that he can tell that his cheekbone is going to bruise. His hands are shaking, which he only realizes when he spills milk all over the floor.

He feels a little better after breakfast, though he has to eat two bowls of cereal instead of his usual one. He buys a coffee and a Red Bull from the corner store near school, and chugs them both before he heads in. By the time he gets to his first class, he's almost fully functional. He can pass as human, at least, which is all high school really demands.

Calc is fine, English is better. He got an A on his English essay, a check plus on his problem set. The only problem, really, is that his schedule this year has him on a late lunch block. He has to wait until 2, meaning that he has Western Civ, Spanish, and AP Physics to get through before he can get a soda and some food. He starts drifting off in Civ, but he keeps it together; by the time he gets to Spanish, though, he's nodding off, his notes devolving into nonsense and sloping down across the page. He can't seem to stop it, either; he's aware of the feeling, the slow close of his eyelids and the gradual drop of his head, but it's like a waking dream.

Physics is an even worse mess; Lydia kicks him in the ankle every five minutes, but he's still managing to fall asleep. He finally just gets up and gets a bathroom pass from Ms. Wolff. He sits in one of beige metal stalls. He keeps his feet square on the floor, his hands flat on his knees. He takes deep, deep breaths. They're loud inside the stall. He can feel himself waking up, slowly. 

He stays for too long. Then he spends another few minutes splashing water on his face and using the hand dryer to dry it off. Ms. Wolff gives him a look when he gets back, but she doesn't say anything. Lydia just rolls her eyes. 

Lunch helps. They have soda and energy drinks in the cafeteria – God bless America – and he spends the money to eat his weight in questionable meatball sandwiches. He's feeling better, at least until Scott turns on him and says, "You look kind of tired, dude."

Stiles wedges a meatball into his mouth to buy himself some time. He hasn't figured out what to say by the time he's done swallowing, though, so he just says, "Yeah, I guess I'm tired. I stayed up late."

"Oh?" 

"Homework." Scott looks skeptical, so Stiles gears himself up. "Okay, so I actually played video games. But it was worth it, holy shit. Have you tried Bastion? You play this little man, and he rolls and flips everywhere, and there's this amazing announcer. And the graphics, seriously. You have to come over and try it."

It is a fact of life that Scott McCall is easy to distract. Alpha status hasn't changed that. He's already googling the game on his phone. "Dude," he says.

"Dude," Stiles agrees.

\---

The last two classes of the day are relatively easy, especially compared to the shitshow of the morning. Stiles is scraping the bottom of the barrel, energy-wise, but he's awake and present and firing on nearly all cylinders. 

When he is finally freed from school at the end of the day, though, he just wants to go home and make out with his bed. That means, of course, that Derek is standing next to Stiles' car. He's wearing sunglasses, a henley, and – if Steph Broder's appreciative leering is anything to judge by – the jeans that raise his ass from "excellent" to "phenomenal."

"I miss the lurking days," Stiles tells him. "What do you want?" 

"I must have been missing the pleasure of your conversation." Derek takes off his sunglasses, probably so that Stiles can better appreciate his raised eyebrow. 

Stiles retaliates by pointedly not noticing Derek's expression. "Sweet burn, dude. My question stands."

Derek almost-laughs. "I wanted you to look into gremlins."

"Not the movie kind, I'm assuming."

"No." 

"Did you talk to Scott?" Stiles says, unable to resist the dig.

Derek makes a face, but he nods. "I did. I texted him. He agreed I could handle them, with some research."

"Okay, I'll look into it."

Derek nods, but he doesn't move, and he's blocking the driver's side door. Stiles holds up his keys and jingles them. "Since that's settled, do you think you could let me into my car?"

Derek shifts from foot to foot, but he doesn't move. "Should you be driving?"

"What?"

"You look tired. And you smell off."

"I'm fine," Stiles says cautiously. 

Derek puts his sunglasses back on. He nods, and then steps out of the way. 

Stiles climbs in his car and drives away. This day has been entirely too fucking long. 

May calls him at four, only a few minutes after he's dragged himself up the stairs and into his bedroom. He's spread eagle on the bed, his face turned into the pillow; he groans when he hears his phone ring, but when he sees it's her he pushes himself up to his elbows. "Hi," he says. "I thought you hated the phone."

"I do. I wanted to check on you."

Stiles wants to say something smart to that, but what comes out is "thanks," the word small in his mouth. He clears his throat. "I was fine. Sorry if I worried you. I was just a little tired at school."

"A little tired," May repeats.

Stiles turns over onto his side. "Pretty tired. I nearly passed out in Physics. But I had some soda and an energy drink at lunch, it seemed okay after that."

"Jeez," May says. "You're not going to last me very long at this rate."

"No, I will!" Stiles insists. "I figured it out. I just need to stock myself with snacks and soda before I go to school. I was having problems with staying awake in that class, anyway, because they have me at a 2:00 lunch. It's the administration's fault, really, not yours."

"Stiles," she says.

"I'm just saying." He can hear how sulky he sounds, but he can't help it. He wants to see her.  
She ends up saying that they can't go out more than twice a week, and she won't back down, not even when Stiles whines.

\---

May isn't wrong, though, as much as Stiles wishes she were. They fall into a habit of seeing each other on Saturdays and Wednesdays; he's stumbling and useless on Sundays and Thursdays, and sluggish on Mondays and Fridays. He's all right – with judicious application of coffee, sugar, Red Bull, and cat naps – but he knows it's taking a toll. His grades haven't dropped, for the most part, but he's treading on the thin edge of a B+ in Physics. 

For May, though, Stiles can hold it together. 

She's a complete dicksmack, is the thing. She's got a nasty sense of humor, she doesn't like _anyone_ , and once she's made up her mind she won't change it for love or facts. She acts a little like Stiles, in other words, if he didn't have his affection for Scott and his dad to hold him back from being a complete and total jerk. 

When Stiles is a jerk around May, she doesn't counter it. She eggs him on. The feeling is heady. It's worth being in a fog for two days a week. It's worth a B+ in Physics. It's worth the colds he starts getting, and the pudge he develops from too much Red Bull and the way his heart has started pattering a little too quick in the morning.

"You're a total dick," she tells him, and she sounds admiring.

\---

Stiles has managed to foist off the worry of his friends, mostly by way of sarcasm and well-timed caffeine consumption. Lydia knows that he's more likely to sleep through Physics than not, but she hasn't seen him napping in the library. Scott has seen him put his face down and doze through lunch, and caught him in the library once, but he doesn't know about Physics. Isaac noticed that one time when he couldn't stop slurring his words, but otherwise Stiles has skirted his attention. 

The only person that might throw a wrench in the works is Derek. 

Derek obviously can't know about the stuff that goes on at school, unless he's stepped up his lurking game a lot. He's around a lot, though, and he seems to be looking at Stiles more often these days. 

Stiles can't exactly avoid Derek right now, that's the real problem. He's been researching the gremlins for Derek, and they have to stay in touch about that. Stiles wraps the report up as quickly as he can, because he's nearly at his limit. He sends Derek a text – Derek just says _k_ – and gets everything stacked on his desk. He can hand it off, usher Derek out the door, and have one less roadblock in his way. 

Of course the plan gets derailed, though. That seems to be a theme of Stiles' life these days.

Stiles was going to do work while he waited for Derek, but when he sits down he can't seem to concentrate. He minimizes his programs and stares at his desktop background, instead. He changed it to a plain black screen recently, since the picture he'd had before was irritating his eyes. Tonight the black seems to be moving, almost like it's throbbing in time to his heartbeat. He can't seem to pull his eyes away, once he's noticed it. It's soothing.

Stiles was expecting his dad to call up the stairs when Derek gets there. Derek must be feeling nostalgic, though, because he comes in through the window. 

Stiles doesn't realize Derek is there. When he snaps out of his desktop-induced trance, Derek is already sitting on his bed. 

Stiles startles and nearly falls out of his chair. Derek doesn't move at all, just keeps staring at Stiles' face. 

"Your resting heart rate has gone up," Derek says. 

"Yes, hi, it's lovely to see you," Stiles says. He takes a deep breath, willing futilely for his heart to slow down. He picks up his papers and taps them to neaten the stack, trying to think of how he can play this off. It feels like his eyes are tracking wrong. He wishes futilely for it to be Friday, already. He'd be able to do this if it were Friday. "I have the research done," he finally says, hoping that Derek will consent to being distracted. "It's mostly going to be an issue of corralling the gremlins and finding their president."

"President," Derek repeats. 

"Yeah, I thought they had kings, but apparently they've embraced democracy."

Derek snorts and shakes his head. "Of course." He takes the papers when Stiles holds them out and stands up. Stiles congratulates himself on the successful distraction, and spins back to his desk to make it look like he's going to go back to work. It turns out his celebration is a little presumptuous, though. "You're still tired," Derek says, behind him.

"Yeah, you know, senior year."

"Sure," Derek says. 

He doesn't leave, and Stiles risks a glance up. Derek's just staring at him, brow furrowed. Stiles fusses with some papers on the desktop and says, "Did you need something else, dude?" 

"Be careful." Derek sounds the same as he did before he left, intoning his words as though he's telling a prophecy. 

Stiles huffs a laugh. "Sure," he says, but he doesn't look back again. "When am I not?"

When Derek finally leaves, Stiles gets up to shut the window.

There's a bag of store-brand Oreos sitting on the windowsill. 

"You're annoying," Stiles says. He thinks he hears a tree rustle, but he can't be sure. "Thanks, though," he adds grudgingly, and shuts the window.

\---

For the two month anniversary of when he met May, Stiles buys some makeup at the store. He does a piss-poor job with the eye stuff. The mascara's all right, if a little clumpy, but the eyeliner comes out crooked, and only looks all right when he's wiped off nearly all of it. The lip gloss goes on well, though. It's close enough, anyway. He doesn't look like a model, like when Lydia made him up, but his lips look sexy and his eyes look big. It's a little emo-boy, but he figures at worse it'll give May something to make fun of.

He texts her when he gets to her house. She's looking at her phone when she comes out, and doesn't look up until she's swung herself up into the passenger seat. When she does look at him, though, her reaction is gratifying. "Heavens," she says. "You look pretty."

"I thought it might be nice." Stiles pulls out, onto the road. Driving gives him an excuse not to look at her; he can feel his neck and cheeks going red. "Or fun, I don't know."

"Nice and fun." Stiles can see her out of the corner of his eye. She's lounging against the door, now, staring at him. "Take a left here."

Stiles does as he's told. "Where are we going?"

"To your school." When he glances over, startled, she smirks at him. "I'd like to make out with you on the bleachers."

"Oh my god." Stiles' voice comes out croaky, and he has to clear his throat. She laughs, long and full, her head tipped back against the window.

The makeup was a really, really good idea.

They wind up next to the lacrosse field, sitting next to each other on the bleachers. The lights by the field are on, and they're bathing everything in fluorescent light. She still manages to be beautiful. He tells her so, and she smiles, almost shyly. "You look good yourself," she says.

"I fucked up the eyeliner," he says.

She turns to straddle the bench, and touches the corner of one eye. He leans into it. "Not by much," she says. "You smudged it, which is good."

"If by 'smudged' you mean 'tried to rub it off,' then yeah."

"That's exactly what it means." She lets her fingers drift down his face, to his mouth. "You should do this more often, really. I bet you'd have a lot more interest from the people at school."

"I only care if you're interested, really," he says. "I hope you are."

She frowns a little and takes her hand away. "Why wouldn't I be interested?"

He looks away, rubbing at his cheek. "Well, I mean, I'm food. Obviously you have to be interested in your food. But I'd like you to be interested in me, too."

When he looks back at her, her mouth is pinched. "That was a really stupid thing to say."

"What?"

"I have to be interested in you because you're my food? You think that's why we're dating?"

"I don't know why else you'd be all that interested in me," Stiles says. "I know why someone else would be into me, okay, because who wouldn't want to date me? Well, what human wouldn't want to date me. Or a werewolf, since they know me, they might want to date me." She's still frowning, and Stiles tries again. "You're a sex demon, okay, it's a much higher bar. I think I'm hot, I'm pretty sure college is going to be a cornucopia of sex for me, but not many people have gotten up on the Stiles train, and then there's you. And you're a sex demon."

She shakes her head. "You're not making very much sense right now."

"I know I'm awesome," Stiles tries. He waits until she nods before he continues. "Most people don't know that, though. My best friend, maybe, and my dad. They know I'm awesome."

"Okay," she says. "I understand that part. Most people are very stupid."

"True. But, okay, I pretty much roped you in with the food thing, so I'm not sure– I want _you_ to know that I'm awesome," he says. "So I'm trying to figure out how to make you see that I'm awesome."

She squints at him. "The makeup is you trying to be awesome?"

"To be special," he says, and it feels right, so he repeats it. "Special, I want to be special. To you."

"You're being an absolute moron," she says. He rubs his cheek against his shoulder, embarrassed, but he looks back over when she grabs his hand. "I already know you're special."

"Because I volunteered to be lunch?"

"Because you're really very weird." She rests their clasped hands in her lap, then scoots closer on the bench and rests her chin on his shoulder. "I've met weird people before. But you're a very distinct breed."

"Thanks," he says. He actually kind of means it.

She leans forward, catching his chin with one hand, and pulls his mouth around to her. The angle starts to hurt his neck after a minute or two, so he shifts to sit sideways on the bench, facing her. When she pulls away from him, her mouth has smears of his lip gloss on it. He wipes at it with one finger, shows it to her when her brow furrows. 

"This is the problem with kissing when you have makeup on," she says. "Messy."

"Yeah, yeah," he says. He can't think of a better comeback. He's too focused on leaning closer, getting back to kissing.

"Stop," she says. 

He stops, obediently, hovering a few inches away. "What is it?"

"Go down on me."

They haven't done that yet, not for lack of whining on Stiles' part. They've rubbed off together in his car, jerked each other off in movie theaters and at her house, but she's never let him go beyond ducking his head. "What's different?" he asks, because apparently it's a day for shooting himself in the foot.

"I feel like it," she says. "Be quiet and do as you're told." 

Stiles, wisely, shuts up and obeys. He puts his hands on her stomach and pushes, a bit, getting her to lean back on one elbow. The bleacher bench is too narrow for her to really get comfortable like that, though, and he finally pulls off his jacket so that she can wad it up and put it under her head. She gets herself situated, lying back, her head propped up. She's got a double chin when she looks down at him. She still looks beautiful.

"Holy shit," Stiles says. "You're gonna let me–"

"I told you to be quiet," she says, but it comes out charmed. She unbuttons her jeans and pushes them down, until Stiles gets the point and tugs them down to the tops of her thighs. "You're not going to have much to work with, sorry," she says. "And this bench is frigid."

"It's not even cold outside, though."

"I'm aware." She wiggles her butt, waiting for it to warm up, before she pushes her underpants down. 

She can't really spread her legs like this, and Stiles can't really see what she looks like. Her jeans are cutting into the tops of her thighs, and he's not going to be able to get his fingers into her, and his tongue and jaw are going to be even more sore than they would be otherwise, and– "Fuck this," Stiles decides, and yanks her jeans and underwear down around her knees.

"Stiles!"

"We're going to get arrested for public indecency either way," he points out. He kisses the top line of her pubic hair, below the curve of her belly. "At least this way I'll actually have a shot at doing it right."

She considers this, looking up at the sky instead of at him. After a minute, she bites her lip and spreads her legs, bending one knee to pull them wider apart.

Stiles has no idea what he's doing. He's never gotten the chance to go down on someone, and even though he's read a lot about it – and watched a lot of porn – he's still not sure of the best technique. He wants to do it, though, which most of his sources said was the best starting point. 

She's got a really thick bush, so he has to spread her open to get at her cunt. Her hair is dark brown, and the skin of her lips looks even redder by contrast. She's wet, thank god. She smells like salt water and sweat. It smells good.

"Put your mouth on me already," she says.

Stiles leans in and does it, pressing something like a kiss over top of her clit. She tastes a little briny. He pulls back. "Do you think human beings– humanoids– do you think there's some sort of salt water component–"

"Quiet, Stiles," she growls. Stiles' mouth practically clicks closed. "Will you be able to focus?"

"Yeah. Maybe. I want to," he says.

She gives him a considering look. "Will it be easier if I'm giving you instructions?"

It's entirely possible that she's joking, but it seems like a godsend. "Yes," he says, grateful. "Yes, yes please."

"Okay." She breathes deep, almost a sigh, and grabs hold of his hair, tugging his face down to press it against her. "Kiss my clit, hard."

It's easy to follow her directions; since the beginning, it's seemed like he's hardwired to follow her instructions, and she's good at giving them. He's not always spot-on – "Left. No, your other left, genius." – but he's obedient enough that her voice starts to get breathy, and her instructions start getting interspersed with grunts. She's mostly just rocking against his mouth, by the end, barely talking, and he just tries to keep his tongue rubbing against her clit the way she told him to do. He's got two fingers in her, moving them slowly back and forth. It's unbelievably wet; his cheeks are slick, her pubic hair is sticking to his skin, and his fingers are making slick noises as they move in and out of her cunt. His mouth is sore and his fingers are tired and her pubes are a little prickly, and Stiles is unbelievably happy.

She tenses up, then, her cunt clutching hard around his fingers, and she shoves up hard against his mouth, almost jamming her pubic bone into his nose. He gets out of the way just in time, and replaces his tongue with his hand, rubbing his thumb against her clit to bring her through it. She finally pushes at his hands away, and Stiles wipes them on his jeans before he wipes his face with his t-shirt.

"You're disgusting," she says, watching him through slitted eyes.

Stiles grins and starts to unbutton his jeans. "Yup."

She pushes herself up. Stiles is gratified to see that her arms are shaking. "Scoot back, lie down," she says. 

"Why?" Stiles says, but he does what she says. The bench is cold under his back. "Shit, you weren't kidding about the bleachers being cold."

"It warmed up quickly. Here, take your jacket and put it under your head." She gets his jeans open, pauses to appreciate his underwear, and then shoves them down enough to get his cock out. "I've told you that you have a nice cock, right?"

"No, you didn't, but thanks," Stiles says, bemused. She jerks him a few times, then ducks her head to put her mouth on his dick. "Oh, fuck."

Midway through what is pretty much the best thing ever – how the fuck is Stiles supposed to live knowing that blowjobs exist in the world, for real – Stiles looks over May's shoulders and sees someone standing on the edge of the woods. "Shit," he says, "shit shit shit."

May pulls off and looks around. "What is it?" 

"Guy standing in the woods." 

She twists to look over her shoulder. Her eyes go luminescent green. "Stubble, big muscles, annoyed," she says. She sniffs, and adds, "Werewolf."

"Derek," Stiles says. His hips are twitching up into her hand. "His name is Derek."  
May's gives him a considering look. Stiles shakes his head and says, "Derek, you need to go away." Derek doesn't move. "Go away, Derek. You need to leave."

Derek finally shifts his weight and turns away. May's smiling at him like she's got a secret, but her eyes have gone back to their usual brown. "Shall I?" she asks. 

And– well. "Yeah," Stiles says, and gasps when she goes back down. 

He comes way too quickly, but May doesn't tease him, just tucks him back in and pats the fly of his jeans.

"Thanks," Stiles says, because it seems like the thing to do. His head almost hurts, and he can't focus his eyes. "You're really good at that."

"You don't have much to compare to, right?" 

"Thanks for the reminder."

"Don't mention it," she says, grinning at him.

Stiles packed himself a couple of candy bars, for fortification. She leans against him while he eats them.

After he's finished, he says, "Your eyes were green." 

She wipes a smear of chocolate off of the corner of his mouth. "Yes, they do that."

"Shut up," Stiles says. "No, wait, tell me more."

She snorts. "It's easier to see when I pull down the glamour." It comes out casual, like an offhand remark. Stiles doesn't move; he's learned that she's more likely to talk if he doesn't act like he's listening. 

"You're different than werewolves," he says, trying to match her tone.

"Some of us are, in some ways." She puts her arm around his shoulders. "We both have a better sense of smell than humans. I have more teeth than a wolf, though, more tastebuds. And different things make us shift."

"What makes you shift?"

"Starvation," she says. "There's salt, and runic circles, too. If you see my true face, though, it's most likely because I haven't fed in a long time." 

"What's it look like, your shifted face? Is it like a werewolf?" Stiles asks. He leans away to look at her face, without thinking. 

He expects her to get up – he's broken the mood, asked too much – but she doesn't. She looks strangely vulnerable, more so than he's ever seen before. It looks out of place.

"I don't look like a wolf at all," she says. "Do you– I could show you."

Stiles perks up. "Do it!"

"Well–"

"Do it!"

"Okay," she says. "You can't scream. Don't scream."

"I am incapable of screaming," Stiles reassures her. "Only the manliest yells come from my throat."

May smirks. Her eyes bleed green again, but then she tips her chin forward, hiding her face behind her hair. When she lifts it back up–

Her face has no depth to it. There are no sockets for her eyes, there's no nose, there's no cheekbones. She looks like a sculpture by a child: a disc for a face, round stones where eyes should be, nostrils but no nose, a thin line for the mouth. 

Then the line peels apart. Suddenly there's nothing in her face but her teeth. There are hundreds of them, and they look like shining steel porcupine quills. They're filling her mouth and spilling out, flowering toward him–

Stiles does not scream. He is a man of his word. He does whimper, though. "Okay, stop," he says. "Please." 

And just like that, May is back again.

"Fuck," Stiles says. "Is that– is that under there all the time?"

"I won't do it again," she says, in lieu of an answer. She's almost smiling. It's an ugly expression. "I like how I look, this way."

"I like how you look this way, too," Stiles says, because it's the truth. But May's picking at the toe of her boot, a nervous tic he's never seen before. He adds, "But the teeth are really cool."

"Not really," she says.

"No, really. There are handfuls of them, dude. You've got a bushel of teeth up in there. You should enter an eating competition, it would be really unfair." He pauses. "Is that the secret of those tiny women who win those competitions? Are they sex demons?" 

She smiles, a real smile this time. "I don't think so," she says. Then she cups his chin, and kisses him. Stiles sways into her, like he always does. When she pulls back, he thinks of those teeth, pulling free from his skin– but he can't bring himself to care.

"You really are very special," she says.

"I'm a goddamn hero." 

"I think you might be right."

And for a moment, Stiles believes it. He's special, he's a hero. He grins at her, helplessly, and she smiles back.

\---

He doesn’t remember that Derek saw them until later, back in his room. He flushes hot when he remembers it, and it bothers him until the next time he sees Derek.

Derek doesn’t mention it. He says, “Remember that we have the meeting with the pixies.” 

“Uh, sure,” Stiles says.

“Okay,” Derek says. A muscle in his jaw tics, and Stiles realizes he’s staring. 

“Right,” Stiles says. “Talk to you soon. Sorry about the—whatever.”

“Whatever,” Derek repeats. “See you on Sunday.”

Stiles feels like he got away with something. He’s not entirely sure that’s a good thing, but he’ll take it.

\---

Everything comes to a head on a Thursday.

They had seen each other on their usual Wednesday night; they'd had to cancel their usual Saturday night date, though, and May was hungrier than usual. They ended up skipping their date plans, and made out in the car instead. She'd jerked him off after she was done feeding, and then he'd gotten her off with his fingers. It was a good date. 

Stiles is more groggy than usual the next morning, but he gets himself up and caffeinated and into the car. He pinches the thin skin on the underside of his knee while he drives, to keep himself awake. The traffic signs look like smears of color, the road is a blurry gray mess, but he makes it to school, gets himself into homeroom on time, keeps himself awake through his usual combination of Red Bull and five-minute naps. 

School goes quickly. School seems to go really quickly these days, like he blinks and the day is over. Important things are happening around him, he knows they must be, but they seem to pass without much incident. He figures they can't matter that much, though. He would notice if they mattered.

His parking spot was in the sun, and when he gets out of school the car is warm and stuffy. Even with the windows open, there's still a faint scent of come from their 'date' on the night before. 

Stiles thinks about her as he drove home: how her hair had looked, how her breasts felt in his hands, how she had sucked on his lips, how she needed him. They had talked about something. He can't remember what it was, but he remembers that she was laughing and teasing him. What had she said? Something about hyenas, maybe. It was funny at the time.

Stiles realizes abruptly that he's going too slowly. His foot must have eased up off of the gas pedal without his permission. He presses down, carefully, checking the speedometer to make sure he doesn't go too fast. He goes five miles faster, then ten.

He looks up from the dash to find that there's no road ahead of him, just trees–

The car crashes through a gap, the metal shuddering around him, and then slams into a tree. Stiles is thrown forward into the steering wheel, then back. He's suspended for a moment, has time to think _another car crash_ , and then he slams into the seat.

The window shield has cracked. The driver's side window has shattered. The hood is crumpled. Stiles felt a pop in his ribs when he hit the steering wheel, in his knee when it jammed up against the ignition. 

His head is floating over his body.

His eyes aren't working right; everything is streaking and smearing, worse than before. His mouth is filling with blood. 

He turns his head. Cold sparks fly up his neck. 

"Help," he says. His voice comes out in an uneven whisper. He doesn't know where he is. Probably no one can hear him. "Help," he says, louder. 

His eyelids droop. 

"Stiles," Derek says.

"Derek?" The name comes out slurred. Stiles spits out the blood, drooling down his chin. Derek respond; he's prying the door off of the Jeep. "Don't hurt the car," Stiles says.

"Shut up," Derek says. It's reassuring. 

When Derek tears through his seatbelt, Stiles holds up his arms and tries to smile at him. "Can you take me home?"

"I can take you home," Derek says. 

He lets Stiles cling to him, and levers Stiles out of the car. He smells like Derek, a little bit of sweat and a little bit of hair gel, mixed with cheap laundry detergent. Stiles pushes his face into the crook of Derek's neck and closes his eyes. It feels almost child-like. That might be the head trauma talking, though. "Might be trauma," he says.

"No shit," Derek says. 

Stiles laughs, and then regrets it. "Ow," he says.

"Stiles," Derek says. It sounds helpless. "I'm going– it'll be okay."

"Tell May it's not her fault," Stiles says. He can feel Derek's sudden inhale under his cheek. He tacks on, "It's not your fault either. It's neither of your faults. Or my dad, tell my dad–"

"We'll talk after the hospital," Derek says.

Stiles wants to protest – he told Derek to take him home – but then Derek is moving, and Stiles has to close his eyes in the face of sudden nausea.

\---

Emergency rooms have a particular sound. There's a background hum of machines, and voices, and fluorescent lights. It's pierced at random intervals: there's the squeak of rubber soles on linoleum, the sudden bang of the doors, the raised voices of angry patients. It's a buzzing, unsettled quiet.

When Stiles wakes up, he knows exactly where he is, even before he opens his eyes. There's a baby wailing somewhere. _I know how you feel, baby,_ Stiles thinks, and opens his eyes.

He slams them shut again. "Ow, fuck," he says. It comes out wrong, so he tries again. "Fuck."

"Language," his dad says.

"Hi, dad." Stiles opens his eyes a sliver and turns his head in the direction of his dad's voice. "How're you?"

"I've been better." His dad's hair is flat on one side; he always has to lean his head against the wall when he sleeps in hospital chairs. He holds out a water, lets Stiles sip from the bendy straw for a while. "You scared me, kiddo."

"Sorry," Stiles says. "I crashed the car again."

"You crashed yourself again," his dad says. "I don't care about the car."

"Right," Stiles says. "Dick move, huh."

"Yeah," his dad says, bluntly. "You want to tell me what the hell was going on?"

"No." Stiles takes a deep breath. "But it was– I was tired. I stayed up too late."

"Was it something to do with your friends?"

"Sort of," Stiles says. It's the closest he's come to the truth thus far. 

His dad puts his hand over his face for a long moment. He sighs, and says, "Okay. I called Scott and talked to him. He said he's looking into it."

"Okay," Stiles says. He can probably warn May, if the doctors let him out soon. When he's been here before, they've let him out pretty quickly – their insurance isn't bed-rest good – so he should be all right. "Sounds good."

"You're going to call Scott and give him details," his dad says. Stiles opens his mouth to object, but his dad gives him the "you nearly died again" look. Stiles shuts up. "I'm going to go talk to Ms. McCall about you," his dad adds, a little more kindly.

Stiles doesn't expect it, but the next person through the door is Derek. He's wearing a green hospital scrub shirt. Stiles tries to make a face at him, but it hurts too much. 

"My dad said I have to talk to you," Stiles says, by way of greeting.

"You crashed your car into a tree," Derek says. "You've been out of it for at least a month, your appetite has gone up, you've lost at least fifteen pounds, there's damage to your stomach, and your heartbeat is erratic."

Stiles blinks at him. "That was a lot of clauses."

"Don't," Derek says. The word is softer than Stiles expected; it makes the rude reply he was thinking of stop up in his throat. "Someone's hurting you. Who is it?"

"No one's hurting me," Stiles says. "Listen to me, I'm telling the truth, no one's hurting me, no one hurt me."

Derek makes an abortive gesture, then lets his hand fall to his side. "Who made you crash into a tree?"

"No one, I was by myself."

"Who made you so tired?"

That makes Stiles pause. "There's a lot of reasons why I would be tired," he says, finally. It's not a lie. "There's a lot going on."

"Is it the girl?" 

"Who?"

"The girl, the woman I saw you with at the lacrosse field."

Stiles smirks, a last-ditch effort. "So we're talking about that now? I thought we weren't going to acknowledge your voyeurism. Ignore and deny, that's the tack we've always taken–"

"So it's her," Derek says.

Stiles opens his mouth, but he can't come up with anything. His mind feels sluggish, and his eyes still hurt. He hurts all over. "No," he says, finally. "No, don't go after her."

"Stiles," Derek says. He sounds helpless. "She hurt you."

"She didn't," Stiles says.

"She did." 

Derek puts his hand on Stiles' ankle. Stiles curls his hands in the bedsheets. He wishes he had claws. "She didn't," he says, again, knowing it's useless. "You have to– she's not the problem."

Derek's hand tightens, almost too tight around his ankle. "I know," he says, finally. "It's you. You're always the problem."

"Thanks, sweetheart. That's the nicest thing you've ever said to me," Stiles says. He sort of means it.

The doctor doesn't really want to let him go. His hospital record looks suspicious, and now – apparently – he's malnourished on top of his broken bones and concussion. Mrs. McCall and his dad get him out, though. Stiles should probably be concerned with the state of the American health care system, but he's come to realize that that's a luxury he doesn't have time for. He has things to do.

\---

He calls May as soon as he can, although it takes him way longer to get out of the hospital and out of his father's clutches than he thought it would. She doesn't answer. He leaves a message, then sends a text.

She sends back _3 hours_.

After four hours, she finally calls. "I'm leaving town," she says, instead of hello. 

Stiles feels it like another blow to the head. He braces himself against the desk, and sinks onto his bed. "What?"

"It's complicated," she says. "It's– I've been here too long. Things are getting complicated."

"Not really," Stiles protests. "We can handle it. I thought it was going well." 

"It was," May says. "But—look, I've got to go."

"So why are you leaving?"

"I talked to your friends," she says. Stiles sucks in a breath, but she doesn't stop. "You were in an accident. You're no use if you're dead, Stiles."

Stiles lowers himself slowly, until he's lying flat on his back. He doesn't speak. He can't speak. 

"Stiles," she says. 

After another agonizing minute of silence, Stiles says, "Yeah?"

"I'm old enough–"

"You said–"

"Let me finish," she hisses. It's a vicious sound. Stiles reacts to it like prey, going still and silent. She says, "I know some things you don't know. I know that my survival is the most important thing. You can't help other people if you're dead."

Stiles lets out a shaky breath. "So you're surviving. And I was just– what?"

"You were a source of food," she says, soft and cruel.

"But you like me," Stiles gets out, in spite of the pain in his throat. "You said you did."

"Yeah," she says. "Yeah, I said that."

"And you meant it."

She's quiet for a long time. He can hear her breathing. "I meant it," she says, finally. "And that doesn't matter."

Her breathing cuts off, then. Stiles pulls his phone away from his ear to check. The call's been disconnected.

He calls back.

He calls back.

He calls back.

"It's not fair," he says, to the answering machine.

Three days later, his calls stop going through.


	3. Chapter 3

Derek made May leave.

"No," Scott says. He sits down on the bed next to Stiles. "I went with him. I was the one who talked to her."

"He was the one that told you, then," Stiles says. "He made it seem like a bigger deal than it was–"

"She's a succubus," Scott says flatly.

"A sex demon!" Stiles says. Scott raises his eyebrows, and Stiles clears his throat. "It's an important distinction. And I wanted her to stay, I liked her."

"She was killing you," Scott says.

Stiles wants to say something melodramatic, like _maybe I wanted her to_. It's not true. He wanted to live; he just also wanted to make out with May. "It was going fine," Stiles says, finally.

Scott just sighs. Stiles looks down at his hands. The bandages around his knuckles are already peeling, even though he put them on in the morning.

"She made you smell wrong," Scott says. 

"Thanks a lot."

"You know what I mean," Scott says. "You smell exhausted, and hurt. Not just from the car accident, either, I don't know why I didn't notice it before."

"May used glamours," Stiles says. "I think maybe she used a few on me." Stiles' reflection certainly looks worse to him now. He's pale and hollow-eyed, his ribs stand out and there are bruises all over his shins. 

"And that's why she had to leave," Scott says. 

Stiles shakes his head. "I could have–"

"You could have _died_." 

Stiles doesn't look up from his hands. He can't. He knows the expression that Scott will have on his face, and he wishes more than anything that he didn't. "I'm sorry," he says. He puts his hand on Scott's knee. "I mean it. I'm sorry."

"I hate that you did this," Scott says. He rests his head on Stiles' shoulder, gently. Stiles shifts until he's not resting on a bruise. "You should have told me."

Stiles doesn't comment on the irony, even though he wants to. He squeezes Scott's knee and says, "I had it under control. I thought I had it under control."

"I'm sorry," Scott says. 

Stiles snorts. "We're a couple of losers, sitting around apologizing to each other."

"But I really am sorry." Scott leans against him, gently, just nudging Stiles' shoulder with his own. Stiles wants to be mad at him, he really does, but he can't. It's Scott. 

"You're a dick," Stiles says, and turns his face into the crook of Scott's neck. Scott doesn't say anything, just rubs his back while Stiles sniffles. 

\---

Stiles maintains that May wasn't hurting him that much. Under the force of Scott's worst puppydog eyes, though, he will admit that he's taking a long time to recuperate from his accident. The cuts on his hands and face linger longer than they're supposed to. He's still bruised, weeks after the accident, and he's still having trouble climbing stairs. He's going to bed at nine, and stumbling groggily through his early morning classes. 

The slow pace of Stiles' recovery seems to make Scott think that he should hover. Scott sits with Stiles at lunch. He walks with Stiles to the classes they have together. More often than not, he comes home with Stiles. He does his homework at Stiles' house, or talks to him over Skype, or harasses him into playing videogames online. Sometimes, when Scott can't be around, he sends Isaac. It's hilariously uncomfortable – Isaac clearly has other things he wants to be doing – but even when Stiles tells him to go, Isaac won't leave.

Even if Scott weren't hovering, though, there's still Stiles' dad to deal with. His dad falls back into the habit of checking on Stiles at night, and he comes home for meals that he otherwise would have eaten out. He doesn't even complain about eating his vegetables.

Lydia even gets in on the act, in her own way. She's angry with him for lying to her, Stiles knows that, but she's still taking him to the mall for smoothies and dragging him to her nail salon. She buys him a pedicure and perches on the chair next to him, keeping an eye on the technique of the poor woman charged with scraping at his feet.

It's enough to make Stiles go a little crazy. He tries to buck up. Every time he wants to shove Scott out the window – it would be so cathartic, and Scott wouldn't even get hurt – Stiles reminds himself that he scared them, that he was in a car accident, that he could have died, that he lied to them without compunction. Stiles wouldn't do it for anyone else, but for them he tries to keep himself in check. 

It takes a few weeks of biting his tongue, but they stop hovering as much as before. 

Scott still sits with Stiles at lunch, and they still play videogames. Scott doesn't walk Stiles to all of his classes anymore, though, or follow Stiles home. Stiles’ dad starts eating dinner at the station, instead of making the trek home. Lydia stops making him go to the mall quite as often, and goes back to making him go dutch on their smoothies.

Slowly, Stiles falls back into the routine he had before May. He goes to school, he does his homework, he feeds his dad microwave dinners and easy one-pot meals. He beats Diablo again, and finishes Bastion, and kicks Scott's ass at Call of Duty. They find a Tatzelwurm who likes to be stroked on the head, and convince a gryphon to relocate.

They exorcise one demon. The demon stares at Stiles while Stiles is reading the exorcism. Just before Stiles finishes, the demon says, "May says that she–"

Stiles wants to hear it. He wants to tell the demon something to tell her. He wants to find out how demon society works, whether or not he could speak to May with any demon they meet.

He doesn’t say any of those things. He says, " _Amen_ ," and snaps the book shut. The demon pours up out of its host. 

“Are you okay?” Scott says, afterwards.

“Fine,” Stiles says, and leaves.

\---

The only one who doesn’t stop is Derek. 

Derek isn't exactly hovering. He’s there, sure, but he doesn’t interact with Stiles all that often. He helps out with the demon, and has to be talked out of adopting the Tatzelwurm. Stiles doesn't speak to him, though. Stiles was always the one who spoke, so it means that they don't talk at all. It's not worth it. What would Stiles even say?

What Derek _does_ do is leave things. More specifically, he leaves food.

Stiles first finds food on his desk a week or so after he gets out of the hospital. It's a glass dish with scalloped potatoes out of the box. It's covered with tinfoil, with "Stiles" written on top. Even after the Oreos, Stiles doesn't think of Derek. It doesn't make any sense: why in the hell would Derek drive Stiles' girlfriend out of town, stop speaking to him, but then leave him terrible salty potatoes?

He texts Scott first. _Dude, did you leave me scalloped potatoes?_

_No. Why? What happened?_

_Just some food I found. Did Isaac or Allison make them?_

A longer pause, then, _No._

It certainly can't be Lydia. If it was her, the dish would be some sort of gourmet lamb thing, made by a real chef. It can't be anyone other than Derek.

He sends Derek, _Leave me alone. I HATE YOU_.

Derek doesn't send anything back, of course.

After about ten minutes of doing his homework, Stiles goes downstairs to get a fork. He eats all of it. They take forever to make, he rationalizes. He always wants to buy them at the grocery store, but they take twenty-five minutes, even out of the box. 

He chews them angrily, at least.

\---

He doesn’t tell the others about the food. He tells May.

 _Derek keeps leaving me food_ , he sends.

His phone says that his texts are delivered. The number is disconnected, Stiles knows that. He's not stupid. Still, it makes Stiles feel better, less like she was some figment of his imagination. It’s a way to let off steam.

_You should tell me about glamours sometime. Did you use one on me?_

_I'm so angry, all the time._

_I miss you. Why did you leave?_

Missing May is like when Stiles first got his buzzcut; he would try to run his fingers through his hair and suddenly realize it was gone. He can avoid thinking about her during the day, most days, but not at night. Wednesday and Saturday nights are the worst. He thinks of dates he wants to take her to, things he wants to do with her.

 _What about the beach?_

_Do you like mazes? I heard there's a hedge maze a couple of hours away._

Late at night, he tells her, _I'd go down on you for hours. I loved the feeling of you on my face. I want your hand on my cock._

It always says "delivered." 

The automated message when he calls is always the same. Three tones, and “We’re sorry, the number you are trying to reach–"

Stiles hangs up.

\--- 

A week after he comes home to scalloped potatoes, he finds another dish on his desk. It's a disgusting cauliflower and cheddar casserole. A week later it's beef stew, slightly congealed and very obviously made entirely out of cans. Then it's mashed potatoes with too much garlic. 

Stiles eats it all, even though he shouldn't. It's shitty food, and it's Derek's food, but it's filling. Stiles is hungry all the time, these days. And there's comfort in the starch and salt.

He leaves the dish under his window each time. He doesn't bother to wash it. 

He's finally goaded, though, after the kale chips and roasted brussel sprouts. They're burnt. It's not like Stiles cares – he doesn't care – but how do you fuck up kale chips and brussel sprouts? He's seen Derek's oven, it's got a light and a little window in the front. You just get a book and sit in the kitchen to keep an eye on them. Stiles sometimes overcooks his Hot Pockets, and even he can keep an eye on vegetables.

He never asked for this. The least Derek could do is do it right, if he's going to try to, whatever, make up for what he did.

Stiles finishes eating the charred remnants, shoves the dish in a plastic bag and starts walking. 

Stiles just gets angrier and angrier on the way over. The dish bangs against his thigh with every step, a steady reminder of how Derek made May leave – how he shit all over Stiles' one special thing, his movie-star story – and now has the nerve, the nerve to act like he cares. Derek doesn't care. That's Derek's defining trait, he doesn't care. He wants Stiles to shut up and stop talking, he wants everyone to leave him alone, he wants to leave town, he wants to pretend it all didn't happen. He doesn't get to change that. It's not fair.

His phone is full of angsty lesbian folk-rock and indie shoegaze, but it's doing nothing to calm him down. He turns it off, but the motion is much less satisfying than it should be; the screen doesn't lend itself to angry gestures. He rips his earphones out, which is a little better.

Derek has a new place, but it’s about as ratty as the old place was; the front door to the building opens after Stiles applies his shoulder a few times. By the time Stiles gets up the stairs to the door of Derek's apartment, though, he’s red-faced and panting. His thighs are shaking a little, and he's breathing hard. He has to bend over and brace himself on his knees until his heart stops stammering in his chest.

"Hey fucker," he calls, when he gets his breath back. "Shitfaced cowardly motherfucking asshole, come out. Cocksucking dickrag, douchey slime-faced _fuck_." 

It's silent. He's pretty sure Derek's there. He's always there, lurking.

Stiles sucks in another breath to shout, "Come out here and face me." He bangs on the door, hard enough to make it shake, but it doesn’t give. If he were a werewolf, Stiles could rip it open, he could force Derek to come out.

"Fucking fuck," Stiles says, quieter this time. He turns around and slumps against the door, sliding down to rest his butt on the floor. The dish bangs into his knee as he goes down. He's probably going to bruise.

That's when Derek chooses to open the door. Stiles flounders and almost falls on his face, only catching himself at the last second. Derek leans over him. He's shirtless and sleepy-eyed and gorgeous, of fucking course. 

"Hi," Derek says.

"Fuck you," Stiles says.

Derek raises his eyebrows. "What do you want," he says, almost like a question.

"I want you to bring her back," Stiles says. He doesn't expect the words – he meant to say something about the kale – but he still manages to keep his voice steady. 

"Who?" Derek's face rearranges into a pleasantly inquisitive expression. It looks wrong on his face. 

"You know who," Stiles says. He pushes himself up, off of the floor, but he doesn't go any closer. "May. Bring her back."

"I didn't–"

"You did," Stiles says. He stops, reining his voice back in. "Scott said he did it, but he was lying. You did it, you made her leave."

Derek doesn't bother to deny it again, just says, "Yeah. I did. Is that all?"

"Bring her back."

"No."

"No?" Stiles repeats.

"No," Derek says. "She didn't belong here."

"What the fuck," Stiles says. "What the actual fuck are you talking about, dude? She belonged here just fine. She put her trash out on time, she paid her taxes, she paid her rent. She didn't bother anyone."

Derek huffs a laugh. "I would say she was bothering you."

"Me," Stiles says. "She wasn't bothering me. It was the exact opposite of bothering. I don't know if you understand how sex works, but– you know, when two people love each other very much–"

"Come inside," Derek says.

Stiles takes a step back. "No, I'm not coming inside."

"You really want to have this conversation in the hallway?"

Stiles hesitates, but he really doesn't. "Fine," he says, and barges past Derek into the apartment. "Fuck, fine. So explain to me again why you ran my girlfriend out of town for my benefit."

"She was feeding on you." Derek pushes his door closed. 

"I knew what I was doing," Stiles says. 

"You're a teenager," Derek says. 

"Oh, so a teenager can't know what they're doing, now? Great, glad we clarified that. You want to talk about your pack, then?" Derek growls. "You don't get it, do you? Let me spell it out for you, then: you bit a bunch of teenagers, Derek, and if teenagers can't know what they're doing–"

"I get it," Derek says. 

"I don't think you do. I think you decided that I couldn't possibly make my own decisions, conveniently ignoring that I'm the same age as the people you _turned into werewolves_ , and you drove my girlfriend out of town for doing the same thing."

"Let's say you're right," Derek growls. "She was still a demon. She feeds on sexual energy. She took advantage–"

"She was my girlfriend," Stiles says, his voice sliding sharply up. His cheeks are suddenly hot, and he knows he's probably blotching up on his throat and jawline. He should stop and take a second, but it seems like he can't. "She _is_ my girlfriend."

"No," Derek says. He sounds patient. "No, she wasn't. She was using you."

"Fuck you," Stiles says. He can feel tears welling up, and he has to press the heels of his hands into his eyes. "She loved me."

"You were her prey," Derek says. It sounds almost helpless. 

"It doesn't matter," Stiles says. Derek opens his mouth, but Stiles cuts him off sharply. "It doesn't matter. Yeah, I was her prey. And she loved me. She fucking loved me." 

"Stiles," Derek shouts, almost a roar. The hair on the back of Stiles’ neck stands up, and Stiles can't– 

He can't breathe.

He knows he's breathing. His lungs are pushing out and pulling in. It isn't going to last long, though. They're pushing against a band that's cinching tighter and tighter. 

The room comes into stark focus. The colors wash out. Stiles staggers back, away from Derek, who is pinkish-grey and black and too sharply defined. Stiles’ eyes are zooming in and out. Derek's face fills the frame, then disappears into a panorama of the room.

Derek reaches for him. His hand punches through the screen.

Stiles throws his hands out in a desperate attempt to push the hand away. Derek startles backward. Stiles rushes past him, as soon as he sees the path cleared to the door. He yanks open the door and hurls himself through it. 

He staggers down the stairs with his eyes closed against the sway of his vision. He’s trapped here, Derek could follow him, anyone could catch him. Stiles just has to make it outside, though. He can make it, he can. 

He nearly falls down the front steps, but he manages to stumble down, out onto the empty sidewalk. As soon as he can find a corner, he pushes his face into it. He tucks his fists up against his chin. He closes his eyes.

He looks ridiculous, he knows, like a crazy person. He's ashamed of himself, but he can't stop. Maybe he is going crazy, maybe this is it, this is when he loses it for good.

He doesn’t go crazy, though. After a minute or two, he can take a full breath in. He opens his eyes, then unclenches his hands. He wipes his face. He takes a step back from the corner, and then another. 

He still has the plastic bag with the dish inside, he realizes. It’s looped around his wrist.

He leaves it on Derek's stoop. Then he walks back home. 

He texts May on the way home. _I don't know what I'm doing._

\---

Stiles isn't sure what he thinks is going to happen with Derek, after the debacle at Derek's apartment. He definitely wasn't expecting Derek to show up in the school parking lot, though. 

Stiles stops dead at the foot of the stairs. Derek squints at him irritably, like Stiles is the irrational one.

"What are you doing here?" Stiles says. This girl Kayla gives him a weird look as she passes by, and he reluctantly starts moving again.

Derek's eyebrows go into Annoyed Mode. "I wanted to know how you were doing," he says. 

"Awww, you were worried about me," Stiles says, but Derek surprises him by nodding.

"You panicked. Had a panic attack." 

"Yeah," Stiles says. "So?"

"My sister used to get them," he says. "They can affect you for a while. And you don't eat enough."

Derek holds out a bag of Cheez-Its.

"Are you kidding me?" Stiles asks. Derek frowns at him. His arm hangs there, Cheez-Its dangling from his hand. Stiles finally reaches out and takes them, just to stop the awkwardness. "Thought you only fed me by sneaking into my room," Stiles says.

"I wanted to give you a ride home," Derek says. "We could talk."

"This is officially the most awkward conversation I have ever had, I hope you know that." 

"Probably not the awkwardest ever," Derek says. 

Stiles shrugs to acknowledge the point. "Fine," he says. "Take me home, Duckworth."

"Sure thing, Mr. McDuck," Derek says, and beeps his car. 

They don't speak to each other on the way to Stiles' house. Stiles keeps opening his mouth and shutting it again. Derek's the one who said that they should talk, and Stiles has no idea what they're supposed to talk about. 

When they pull up next to Stiles' house, Stiles puts his hand on the door handle and says, "Well, this was fun."

Derek turns off the car. "I wanted to talk here," he says.

Stiles takes his hand off the door handle. "What?"

"This way you can get out of the car," Derek says patiently. 

Stiles squints at him. "When did you get considerate?"

"You're one to talk."

"Ooh, sweet burn," Stiles says. "Is that what you wanted to talk about, that we're both horrible people? Point made, conversation over."

"No," Derek says, and then hesitates.

"What? Spit it out."

"I had a girlfriend in high school," Derek says. He stops again. 

"Cool," Stiles says, mystified.

"She was older than me."

Stiles huffs. "Is this going to be a sob story? Because I have calc homework to do, dude, you should get to the point."

"Yeah, it is," Derek says, humorlessly. He puts his hands on the steering wheel, flexing his fingers. "You remember Kate Argent?"

"Terrifying blonde? The one who– oh my god _what_." Stiles gapes at Derek. Derek doesn't look over. His hands squeeze around the steering wheel. "What," Stiles repeats. "Are you kidding me?"

"No, not kidding," Derek says. 

"You have really bad taste," Stiles says, because he is the master of saying the absolute worst thing in any situation.

Derek doesn't claw Stiles' face off, though. He smirks, slightly, and says, "Yeah, it's come up."

"So– you thought May was my Kate Argent," Stiles says, slowly piecing it together. "Because she was an older woman, and you were in high school?"

"Because she was trying to kill you," Derek says through his teeth. "We covered that subject pretty thoroughly."

"Obviously we didn't cover it enough. May wasn't Kate Argent, and I'm not you."

Derek tips his head back against the headrest. "Yeah, that much is clear." He flexes his hands around the steering wheel, but then he drops them to rest on his thighs. "I didn't want you to get hurt."

"You make me really angry," Stiles says. He picks up his backpack and the bag of Cheez-Its, levers open the door, and gets out. He doesn't shut the door right away, though. He leans back into the car. "But I get it," he says.

Derek doesn't look over; he starts the car and buckles his seat belt. Stiles slams the door, and Derek drives away, just like that.

\---

He’s distracted the rest of the night. He goes to sleep thinking about it, and wakes up still confused.

Scott notices almost immediately. He leans over his desk in English and pokes Stiles in the arm. His gaze is a little sharper than it would have been pre-May. “Dude,” he whispers. "What's going on?"

"Nothing,” Stiles whispers back automatically, but he catches himself. “No, that's a lie. I found something out about someone."

"Who?"

"No one you know," Stiles says.

Scott looks astonished. "That can't be true."

"Okay, it's someone you know,” Stiles admits. “But it's not something I can tell you. It's a secret, I think. Not something you need to know. Just a thing that the person has kept a secret because they're secretive."

Scott blinks. "Okay," he says slowly. "Sounds good."

"It's not a serious secret," Stiles promises.

"Mr. Stilinski," their teacher says, "Mr. McCall. Please don't make me regret allowing you to sit together."

Stiles puts his hands up and sits back in his chair. "Just discussing the critical legitimization of the American Renaissance," he says. The teacher looks skeptical, but she turns back to the blackboard. 

Stiles doodles all over his notebook for the rest of the period, completely losing the whole Melville-Hawthorne connection their teacher is trying to make in favor of thinking about Derek.

Stiles has only vague memories of the Hales before the fire. There's nothing he clearly remembers about Derek from back then. For all intents and purposes, Derek has always been tall, dark, and tragic. It's hard to imagine him in high school, much less to imagine him dating Kate Argent. 

That isn't to say that Stiles can't imagine it, though. Even worse, it makes all sorts of things click into place in his head.

He opens his text messages to May. He hesitates for a long moment. He finally types out, _Things are so complicated sometimes._ He stuffs the phone back into his pocket without looking to see if it went through.

\---

Stiles started having nightmares more often after Scott was turned into a werewolf. The material for them changed, too. His nightmares used to be about aliens and his dad dying and falling off of bridges. That stuff got mixed in with dreams about Scott stalking him, about Peter having him trapped in a small space, about his dad becoming a vampire. Now he has a few more, about May. Sometimes it's her face in its natural form, coming closer and closer; those are the worst, because Stiles wakes up terrified and sweaty and guilty.

He wakes up from one of those on a Saturday. It's four in the morning. He lies awake for another hour and a half, staring at his ceiling, before he finally admits that he's not going to get back to sleep. 

He can't think of anyone who would be awake at this hour, except for Derek. He knows that Derek goes out for early-morning runs, because Derek's one of those guys, someone who works out for fun and thinks the morning offers him an early start on the day.  
After an hour of dissatisfying Wikipedia binging, Stiles gives up the ghost and texts Derek. _Are you awake?_

It takes Derek ten minutes to respond. _y i am y_

Stiles blinks down at the message for a second before he figures out what it says. He rolls his eyes, and says, _Can I come over?_

_y_

_Do you mean yes or why?_

_yes_

_Was that so hard?_

_y_

Stiles can't help it; he laughs. He slaps a hand over his mouth a second afterwards, but he laughs. He doesn't tell Derek that, though, just says, _Okay, I'm coming over._

When he gets there, Derek swings open the door before Stiles can knock. "Ugh, werewolves," Stiles says, and shoulders into the house.

"Ugh, humans," Derek says. 

Derek is sweaty, and once again shirtless. He's holding a spatula. "Are you going to feed me?" Stiles says, in lieu of commenting on Derek's nipples. "I figured you liked feeding me, what with the casseroles and the terrible vegetables."

Derek huffs, but he calls back, "fine," as he goes into the kitchen. Stiles follows him, and hoists himself up on the kitchen counter. Derek pulls a carton of eggs out of the fridge; there's already something like half a dozen in the frying pan on the stove. "How many?" he asks, holding up the carton.

"Two? Three," Stiles decides, then blurts, "Don’t think I’m not mad at you."

Derek's lips pinch together. He slides the eggs in the pan onto a plate, though, and cracks two more into a bowl. "I said I was sorry," he says, down at the bowl.

"You didn't, actually," Stiles says. He hops down off of the counter and heads into the living room.

It takes Derek a while, but when he comes back into the room he finally says, "I'm sorry you're sad."

Stiles smiles, against his own will. "Nice unapology. 'I'm sorry you feel that way.'"

Derek ignores him, digging into his eggs with a disgruntled expression.

When the eggs are done, Derek goes and puts on a shirt – both a blessing and a curse – and they sit on Derek's ugly couch, knees nudging. They eat in relative silence. 

"The eggs were a little dry," Stiles says, eventually. "Do you use skim milk?" Derek stares at him with horrified eyebrows. "What? What did I say?"

"Are you kidding? Milk?"

“Milk,” Stiles says, patiently. “You know, to make the eggs. What kind of milk do you use?”

“Scrambled eggs don’t need milk,” Derek says. He looks hilariously disgusted. 

Stiles can’t resist. “What kind of heathen doesn’t use milk in scrambled eggs?” he asks, and sits back to watch Derek lose his shit. 

They spend the rest of Stiles' visit arguing about eggs. Derek nearly wolfs out twice. It's actually a really good time, the best time that Stiles can remember in a while.

When Stiles leaves, he's smiling. He isn't anymore by the time he gets home, but it's still the longest he's smiled for a while now. And it's due to fucking Derek. Of course it is.

\---

He keeps going over.

At first, it’s mostly because Derek is able to talk to him about May. With everyone else Stiles knows, it feels like May was never there at all. They didn't meet her; they didn't really realize what was going on. For them, the time when Stiles was dating her were just a period of time when Stiles looked a little peaked or smelled a little off, when he seemed to have less free time than before. It starts to feel like a dream around them, like May shouldn't matter.

She did, though. She was– well, she meant something to Stiles. It's not like he can go back and erase her.

Derek seems to understand that. He can talk about her, even if they never met. 

("I mean, you didn't meet her properly," Stiles says, one day. "You saw her vagina, maybe–"

"Your head was blocking the way," Derek says, "So no."

"But–"

"Shut up," Derek says.

"But–"

"Shut _up_.")

There's a weird shared experience there, too, even if their experiences weren't precisely alike. They don't really talk about it, not that much. Derek just feeds Stiles terrible food – more overcooked casseroles, more dreadful vegetables – and lets Stiles do his homework on the shitty kitchen table. It's a sort of camaraderie, though. At least with Derek, Stiles isn't the only idiot in the room who's been burned by love.

After a while, though, it stops being about May at all. 

Derek is different now, in ways that Stiles wasn’t able to see before. He’s calmer, funnier. He’s going to therapy. He’s considering taking art classes at the community college. His text messages are invariably misspelled and abbreviated.

It feels weird, to feel affection for Derek, but that doesn’t stop Stiles at all.

\---

The last time they talk about May, Stiles is the one to bring food.

Stiles stops at a McDonald's on his way over to Derek’s and buys four of everything off of the breakfast menu. The woman at the counter is genuinely unimpressed with the number of hashbrowns he asks for, but Stiles just smiles winningly and asks for extra ketchup packets.

"Hi Derek, I brought Mickey D's," he announces, as he climbs the stairs to Derek's apartment. 

Derek is rolling his eyes when he opens the door. “Hello, Stiles.”

“Don’t roll your eyes at me,” Stiles says. “You want to use your werewolf hearing to listen to me other times, you put up with me saying hi on the stairs.” 

Stiles is speaking pretty much on auto-pilot. Derek's wearing a shirt this time, but his workout pants are made out of jersey, and Stiles is pretty sure he's not wearing any underwear. Stiles yanks his eyes up a beat too late. Derek's eyebrows are acting confused, but Stiles ignores them. He wags the bags of McDonalds at Derek. "I got you food."

They eat on Derek's couch again. The food is still hot, so it's delicious, but it leaves a thin film of grease on Stiles’ teeth and tongue. He gets himself a glass of water, and brings one back for Derek, too. "Thanks," Derek says. He looks strangely young in the lamplight. Stiles looks away.

"How did you get the gremlins to move out?" he asks. 

"It took a while," Derek says. "I had to talk with the president, and then they had to propose and ratify the bill."

"How big is their Congress?"

"Three gremlins," Derek says. Stiles laughs, startled into it, and Derek smiles. "The Senate has two. The fighting was pretty fierce– they still do duels."

"More nineteenth-century democracy than anything else," Stiles says. "Good to know someone's keeping traditional values alive."

"I liked them," Derek says. He looks like he's going to continue, but then he seems to realize he's talking as much as he is, and he shrugs instead.

Stiles fidgets a little. He normally can fill any silence, but all of the questions and conversational topics he has at hand are complete tone-changers. It felt easy for a little while there, comfortable. The quiet is stretching out, though, so he finally blurts, "You remember that time we talked about Kate?"

Derek looks up. "Yeah, I think I remember that," he says, after Stiles doesn't continue.

"I still don't think May was the same," Stiles says. "She was draining my life force, but she didn't torture me, or hurt anybody else. I mean, I consented. I don't know why you thought it was the same."

Derek's got his elbows resting on his knees, hands loosely clasped between them. He doesn't look up. "I was in love with her," he says. "And I think– I think you might be right. I think she might have loved me, a little bit."

"That's kind of sick," Stiles says, honestly.

"Yeah," Derek says. He rolls his shoulders and sits back on the couch. "Yeah, it's pretty sick."

Stiles scootches closer, until his thigh is pressed all along Derek's.

"Do you think two people can be halves of one another?" Stiles asks. "Or– does that make sense? I mean, do you believe in soulmates?"

"No," Derek says. 

Stiles waits, but Derek doesn't elaborate further. "That was more decisive than I was expecting," Stiles says.

Derek stirs the soup a few times. "My dad was my mom's second husband." 

"Oh?"

"Yeah." Derek finally looks up, meeting Stiles' eyes. "And it's not like she didn't love her first husband. She married him."

"You don't think she was wrong the first time? Maybe she just made a mistake, she didn't–"

"I don't think she did," Derek says. "I don't think you made a mistake."

Stiles sucks in a breath. He drops his eyes back down. After a beat, he says, "But you were right, she was bad for me. I only went after her because I was trying to be a hero, and then I got sucked in. And maybe that was the plan the whole time, that she was going to kill me or whatever, and she didn't care at all."

"She didn't want to care," Derek says. He bumps his shoulder against Stiles'; they're closer than they have been in a while, outside of life-threatening situations. "I think she didn't mean to care, but she did."

"I tricked her into liking me."

"She slipped and fell into liking you," Derek says. "Doesn't mean she was good for you."

"No," Stiles says. He breathes out, hard, and puts his forehead on the heels of his hands. Derek touches him then, putting his hand in between Stiles' shoulderblades. "She did love me."

"I believe you," Derek says, simple and straight to the point. He straightens up, takes his hand away again. 

Stiles closes his eyes, takes a deep breath in and lets it out slowly. "Okay," he says. "Okay."

It’s awkward, for a moment, but then Derek says, “You surprise me, sometimes.”

“What?” Stiles lifts his head.

“You’re... strange,” Derek says.

“Strange?” Stiles cocks his head. “How?”

“In every way,” Derek says, smirking. “But I mean– you're different. Unusual.”

"I don't–" Stiles starts, but Derek cuts him off.

"Don't say anything. Just take it as a compliment."

Stiles bites his lips and huffs. "Thanks," he says, though, after he's beaten back the urge to say _no,_ to say _but,_ to say _shut the fuck up._

"You're welcome," Derek says pointedly.

"Oh fuck you," Stiles says. "Like you're any better."

"That's irrelevant," Derek says, but he's smiling.

\---

Stiles keeps going back to Derek’s after that, but they just– hang out. Stiles finally finishes tagging the bestiary at Derek’s kitchen table. He helps Derek sign up for a local class on gardening, of all things. 

They also watch a lot of trashy television, the kind of thing that Stiles’ dad won’t let him watch. It’s companionable. Stiles likes it, a lot. He likes Derek, it turns out. 

It’s a Friday night, and they’re halfway through an episode of _Bridezillas_ when Stiles kisses Derek.

He’s not sure why he does it. Probably because Derek is laughing, and Derek laughing is something that Stiles didn’t know how much he wanted to see. 

Because Stiles has terrible timing, he does it when one of the brides of the hour is smashing her hand into a wedding cake. Derek’s mouth is half-open, most likely so he can make some scathing comment about her morals. It makes the kiss the wrong kind of spitty.

Stiles pulls back. He and Derek stare at one another.

“So,” Stiles says. “This is awkward. In case you were wondering what this is, it’s awkward.” 

Derek puts his hand on Stiles’ jittering knee, stilling it. “Not that awkward,” he says.

“Wrong.” Stiles bites his lip. “Pretty damn awkward.”

“Try again?” Derek says.

“Okay,” Stiles says, and leans in.

This time, when Derek’s not slack-jawed and surprised, it’s actually a good kiss. Derek doesn’t really dive into it the way that Stiles was expecting; he kisses shallowly, more lip than anything else. When Stiles presses deeper, Derek makes a tiny noise in the back of his throat and tilts his head back.

Stiles wants to make him make that noise again.

He pulls back, instead, and puts his hand on Derek’s shoulder when Derek makes like he’s going to follow. 

His head feels clear. He feels desperate, and a little like someone’s raked their nails over his skin, but he doesn’t feel woozy or dizzy. 

“Okay, that’s interesting,” Stiles says.

“Oh,” Derek says. He makes to push himself off of the couch, and Stiles has to grab for his wrist. 

“Good interesting, I think,” Stiles says. “But I didn’t mean to do that right then. I need to think– I have to go.” Derek’s face folds into a complicated expression, and Stiles adds, “I mean it, good interesting.”

“Okay,” Derek says finally.

 

Stiles walks home feeling completely and utterly confused. When he gets to his house, he doesn’t even go inside, just sits down on the front steps of the house.

He liked kissing Derek, a lot, but Stiles wasn’t expecting to kiss him at all. He knows Derek is hot – he has eyes, after all – and he knew he liked Derek, but he didn’t really know that it was like that.

It was a terrible idea, probably. If Stiles had thought about it at all, he never would have done it. Now that he’s done it, though, all he wants is to do it again. 

When his dad gets home, Stiles is still sitting outside. “Hey,” Stiles says, and winces when his dad immediately looks worried. 

“Is everything okay?” 

“Yeah,” Stiles says, “Everything’s fine. I’m just thinking.”

“Taking up a new hobby, huh,” his dad says.

“Ha ha, nice one.” 

His dad always looks thirty or so to Stiles, younger than he actually is. In the low light from the street, though, his dad looks every year of his age. “I’ve been a real pain in your ass, haven’t I?” Stiles asks.

“I just hope you have a kid some day, so he can give you just as much trouble as you’ve given me.” Stiles snorts. His dad crouches down in front of him, though, and adds, “And I hope he’s just as great as you turned out to be.”

“Jeez,” Stiles says. “Way to hit me where it hurts.”

“You lead a hard life,” his dad says, and straightens back up. “You sure you’re okay?”

“Dandy,” Stiles says. “I just have a crush, I think.”

“Is it a sex demon?”

“No.”

“Then you have my blessing,” his dad says. 

 

“Wow, thanks,” Stiles says. He actually sort of means it.

His dad ruffles his hair before he goes inside, and Stiles leans into the touch. 

\---

 _What if I dated someone else?_ , he sends May.

 _who is this?_ , he gets back.

_Wrong number, sorry._

_you should go for it,_ the random stranger says. 

Stiles snorts. His life is way too symbolic sometimes. _Thanks, dude,_ he sends, and shoves his phone back in his pocket.

\---

Oddly enough, Scott is the one who helps Stiles really make his final decision.

Stiles gets a text from Derek in the middle of lunch on Monday. _ <*)))-{ 2nite if u want_

“Look at this,” Stiles says. He pushes it across the table to Scott. 

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“I don’t know! And all of his texts are that way, seriously. It’s amazing. How didn’t I know this?” 

“He texts me sometimes, but it’s usually high pressure situations,” Scott says. “I thought he had better spelling than that, though.”

“I don’t know, maybe it’s just to irritate me,” Stiles says. He’s distracted, typing in _What the fuck is that supposed to be?_

_fish 3nite if u want_

_*2nite_

“Oh my god,” Stiles says. _Fine_ , he texts back. “Derek is really terrible at cooking, too, did you know that?”

“Really?”

“I think he’s on a quest to make the worst casserole of all time. He made one on Wednesday with these lentils–"

Scott interrupts him. “Okay, enough.”

“What?”

“Enough Derek,” Scott says. “Or explain what’s going on.”

Stiles sits there for a second. His phone buzzes with the message _kkkkkkk_ , and he has to fight back a smile. “You remember how you were with Allison?” Stiles says.

“Really? Derek?” Scott says. He’s a perceptive guy when he wants to be. 

“Yeah,” Stiles says. “I think so.”

“Huh.”

“What is it?”

Scott pokes him in the arm with his fork. “Then I’ll give you an hour to talk about him,” he says.

“You owe me about fifty. Sixty hours. A week. Do you even remember when you guys first started dating? It was nothing but whining about your love–"

“I complained about being a wolf, too,” Scott says, grinning goofily.

Stiles shakes his head. “You’re my best friend, though, you know that?”

“Duh,” Scott says. “You’re mine.” 

Stiles glances down at his phone again. He bites his lip. “He just texted me a bunch of ks in a row,” he says.

“For what?” Scott looks interested, which is perhaps his greatest talent.

“’Okay,’ I think? But there are seven of them. I don’t know why.”

“I never would have guessed,” Scott says.

 _Looking forward to it_ , Stiles sends.

 _m2_ , he gets back.

\---

When Stiles gets to Derek’s place, there’s smoke coming out of Derek’s kitchen window. Stiles stares up at it, mouth open. “Did you burn the fish?” he asks.

Derek pokes his head out of the window. “Come up,” he says.

“You should do something about the building door,” Stiles says mildly, but he goes in anyway. Derek’s left the apartment door open. Stiles closes it, does up the locks, and then dumps his backpack on the couch. “You burned the fish,” he says. The smell is unmistakable, even with all of Derek’s windows open.

“I burned the fish,” Derek says. He’s frowning at the stove like he wants to rend it limb from limb. “I was trying to sear it.”

“Sounds fancy,” Stiles says.

Derek shrugs.

Stiles fiddles with the salt and pepper shakers on the kitchen table. There’s a tablecloth on it. “Were we going to have a real dinner?”

“We can order Dominos,” Derek says, and scrapes the remnants of fish into the trash. 

Stiles retreats to the couch. “I’m going to use the app,” he says. “You want the meat one?”

“Yeah,” Derek says. There’s a loud bang, and then silence.

Stiles bites his lip, and types the order in. “It’s sent,” he says.

“Okay,” Derek says. He’s standing in the door to the kitchen, fidgeting with a dishcloth. “Sorry about the fish.”

“I was a little nervous about you cooking fish, to be honest,” Stiles says. He’s aiming for humor, but it falls flat; Derek starts scowling, and retreats to the kitchen again. Stiles sighs, and says, “I’m going to put on TLC, okay?” 

“Okay,” Derek says.

He doesn’t emerge from the kitchen until the pizza gets there. Stiles sits uncomfortably on the couch in the meantime, watching toddlers in pageant dresses and chewing on his lip. Derek at least joins him on the couch to eat, but they still don’t talk.

When Derek’s finished the last slice and looks like he’s going to try to flee again, Stiles says, “Wait up, I wanted to talk.” He turns off the television. “Okay, so: what are your feelings on kissing again? Us kissing again. A redux of the kissing between you and I.”

Derek doesn’t meet Stiles’ eyes. He looks like he’s contemplating murder, but Stiles is pretty sure he’s just thinking. He’s proven right when Derek finally says, “You decided it was ‘good interesting.’”

“Yeah,” Stiles says. “Sorry about that. I had to figure it out, or whatever.” They sit in silence for a while longer. Derek is staring at his hands. Stiles finally says, “Kissing?”

“This is a bad idea,” Derek says.

“You say this shit like it’s a prophecy, have I told you that?”

Derek finally looks up at him, even though it’s just to scowl. “No I don’t. And it’s a bad idea. We’re both–"

Stiles waits, but Derek doesn’t seem inclined to finish the sentence. “What, damaged?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t think we are,” Stiles says. “But if you don’t want to–"

“I want to,” Derek says.

“Awesome,” Stiles says, which provokes Derek’s first smile of the night. “I figure we’ve already got a leg up, anyway. You’re not a sex demon, I’m not a hunter or an evil druid. The bar is low, but we’ve definitely cleared it.”

Derek shakes his head. 

“I like your shitty cooking,” Stiles says.

“My cooking isn’t shitty.”

“It really, really is,” Stiles says. “It’s horrible. And I like it.” He leans in, and touches Derek’s chin. Derek tips his head up, pressing into Stiles’ hand. 

“I don’t understand,” Derek says.

“I want to date you, that’s what I mean. I want a relationship. I want you to pack me terrible lunches, and make me awful dinners, and also fuck a lot.” Derek’s flushing red, now; Stiles’ face is hot, too, but he gamely keeps going. “I really think we can do it.”

“Okay,” Derek says. 

“Slap me now if you don’t want me to kiss you.”

Derek doesn’t slap him. 

It turns out that Derek’s an even better kisser when he’s had some prior warning. He’s pliant under Stiles’ hands, and he keeps making tiny, cut-off noises. He sounds desperate. 

Stiles digs his fingers into Derek’s shoulders and pushes closer, pressing Derek back against the couch cushions, and Derek outright moans, pulling back to pant. 

Stiles slides his hand down over the fly of Derek’s jeans. “Shit, you’re hard,” he says, stupidly. Derek, thankfully, doesn’t seem to have the brain power to comment on Stiles’ idiocy; he’s busy pushing up into Stiles’ hand. 

“Okay, I’ve got this,” Stiles says. He slides awkwardly off of the sofa, down onto the floor. It’s not as smooth as he’d like, but Derek doesn’t laugh. He looks stunned, actually. Stiles smiles at him encouragingly. “I don’t want to pressure you into sex or anything, but I want to try sucking your dick.”

Derek starts to say something, stops, and clears his throat. “Okay.”

“Okay,” Stiles says, and gets to work on the buttons of Derek’s jeans. “I don’t have a ton of experience at sex in general, or dick-in-mouth in particular. Just as a heads up.”

“You aren’t going to need to know much,” Derek says, and helps Stiles pull his jeans and his underwear off.

Derek’s definitely hard. It’s weird, seeing a hard dick from this angle; it’s something Stiles has seen in porn, but it’s different in real life. He hesitates for a second before he reaches out to put his hand on it. “Wow, okay,” he says.

“You can just jerk me off,” Derek says.

“I’m good, thanks,” Stiles says. He leans forward and presses his nose into the defined line between Derek’s thigh and his hip. “I think I like the smell of crotch,” Stiles mutters, and presses a kiss against the base of Derek’s cock. “Is that weird?”

“A little,” Derek says. 

“Okay,” Stiles says. “I’m sure there’s a support group for me.” 

He licks Derek’s cock before Derek can respond. It tastes like what Stiles would expect dick to taste like, really. It’s not bad, though. He kind of likes it.

Derek doesn’t give him instructions, not like May did, but it turns out that Stiles doesn’t actually need that much. He likes this. He likes exploring Derek’s body, likes trying his thumb against Derek’s asshole and pushing a gasp out of him, likes making Derek writhe when he licks under the foreskin, over the head of Derek’s cock. 

When Derek comes, Stiles gamely swallows. It tastes about the same as his own does, and it means that Derek makes a really stupid-looking face.

“Do you—you could fuck me,” Derek says.

Stiles sucks in a breath, suddenly winded. He can see it. He wants to, but he also doesn't want to fuck this up. "Definitely," he says. "But not yet? Soon." "Soon," Derek says. "Fuck, you're gorgeous." Stiles climbs onto Derek’s lap, straddling his thighs, and says, “Can I come on your face, instead?”

Derek nods. He slouches a little further down on the couch. Stiles yanks his pants open so he can get his hand on his cock. 

“I liked that,” he says. He spits on his hand twice and gives himself one slow stroke before he speeds up, jerking himself off. “My lips are raw, I like that part. And I like your dick.”

“Good,” Derek says faintly.

Stiles doesn’t bother drawing it out. He probably couldn’t, even if he tried; he’s got Derek between his legs, looking at him with his lips parted. “Okay, wow, coming,” Stiles says. Derek closes his eyes and tips his head back even more, and _Christ_ \--

It feels way too good to get come on Derek’s face. He feels a little like a cliché, wanting to mark his territory, but he can’t help it. He sort of wants to rub it into Derek’s skin, but he figures that might have to wait a bit.

“Now I’ve given a blowjob and a facial,” Stiles says. He climbs off of Derek’s lap and flops on the couch next to him. “On the first date, no less.”

“Congratulations,” Derek says. Stiles takes his t-shirt off and hands it to Derek so he can wipe off his face. “Thanks.”

“I’m going to have to borrow a shirt, though,” Stiles says. 

Derek shrugs, but he looks pleased with the idea. “I’ve got a couple.”

“Okay.” Stiles rolls his head to the side. “Your jizz tastes like snot.”

Derek chokes on nothing, going bright red, so Stiles adds, “Mine does too. That’s just always interested me. No one talks about how semen tastes like mucus, but it totally does. It makes sense.”

“Stiles,” Derek says, heavily.

“Shut up?”

“Shut up.”

Stiles manages for a couple of minutes, maybe, but he feels too good. “I meant what I said, before.”

“That semen tastes like snot?”

“Well, yeah. But I meant it when I said I like you.”

Derek doesn’t react right away. Strangely, Stiles doesn’t feel nervous about it. He just watches Derek think about it, waits until Derek says, “Thanks. I like you too.”

“Cool,” Stiles says. “Make me ramen.” 

\---

The greatest part is that Derek actually does make Stiles ramen, after he’s had a chance to wash his face. He does it in his boxer briefs, too, which is even better.

“Do you want me to make you food one of these days?” Stiles asks.

“No,” Derek says. “I don’t like Lean Cuisines.”

“I can make Stouffers,” Stiles protests. Derek just shakes his head. “I’ll have to figure something else out, then,” Stiles says, which gets him a smile.

The ramen is actually pretty good, if a little mushy. Stiles doesn’t say anything about the consistency of the noodles. He and Derek eat across from each other at Derek’s kitchen table, slurping loudly at their spoons.

“Do you really think this is going to work?” Derek says, abruptly.

Stiles looks up. Derek’s glaring at him, but—well, Stiles has had his dick in his mouth, so he thinks he’s never going to take Derek’s glare seriously ever again. Anyway, he knows the answer.

“It’s gonna be great,” Stiles says. “I decided we’re going to be supporting cast.”

“What?”

“Supporting cast,” Stiles repeats patiently. “The comic relief couple. We’re going to be wheeled out for laughs, and we’re never going to break up. The supporting cast is happy forever.”

“All right,” Derek says, and smiles at him. It’s small, but it’s there.

\---

  
Art by [SuperfluousEmi](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1067956).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading!
> 
> My tumblr is [here](http://sinsensory.tumblr.com), if you'd like to talk.


End file.
